Reciprocation was a pretty powerful stimulant to the imagination.

For the best part of 40 years she had genuinely believed that not doing things would somehow prevent regret, when, of course, the exact opposite was true.

What came first – the music or the misery? Did I listen to the music because I was miserable? Or was I miserable because I listened to the music? Do all those records turn you into a melancholy person?

That’s why; he’s worried about how his life is turning out, and he’s lonely, and lonely people are the bitterest of them all

I'm simply pointing out that what happens to us isn't the whole story. That I continue to exist even when we're not together.

One thing about great art: it made you love people more, forgive them their petty transgressions. It worked in the way that religion was supposed to, if you thought about it.

I don't even feel as if I'm the center of my own world, so how am I supposed to feel as though I'm the center of anyone else's?