...a nation could change its way of life, its history, its technology, its art, literature, and culture, but it would never have a real chance to change its gestures.

The writers secret is not inspiration - for it is never clear where it comes from - it is his stubbornness, his patience.

It was in Cihangir that i first learned Istanbul was not an anonymous multitude of walled-in lives - a jungle of apartments where no one knew who was dead or who was celebrating what - but an archipelago of neighbourhoods in which everyone knew each other.

‎The past is always an invented land.

...a nation could change its way of life, its history, its technology, its art, literature, and culture, but it would never have a real chance to change its gestures.

I work seven days a week, from 9 in the morning till 8 at night. I have the titles of the next eight novels I want to write. I feel myself pitiable, degraded on a day that I don't write.

And before long , the msuic , the views rushing past the window , my fathers voice and the narrow cobblestone streets all merged into one , and it seemed to me that while we would never find answers to these fundamental questions , it was good for us to ask them anyway . pg. 284