When they finally did dare it, at first with stolen glances and then candid ones, they had to smile. They were uncommonly proud. For the first time they had done something out of Love.

This perfume was not like any perfume known before. It was not a scent that made things smell better... it was completely new, capable of creating a whole world, a magical, rich world, and in an instant you forgot all the loathsomeness around you and felt so rich, so at ease, so free, so fine.

How quickly the apparently solidly laid foundation of one's existence could crumble.

No human being can go on living in the same house with a pigeon, a pigeon is the epitomy of chaos and anarchy, a pigeon that whizzes around unpredictably, that sets it's claws in you, picks at your eyes.

...talent means nothing, while experience, acquired in humility and with hard work, means everything.

With one glance he had got himself trapped in the brown fundament of her eyes, he was in danger of sinking, as if into a soft, brown swamp, and he had to close his own eyes for a second to get out of it.

...he came to the conclusion that you cannot depend on people, and that you can live in peace only if you keep them at arm's length.