It's better to have a malign providence than an indifferent one.

Our own choices might not be as good as those that are made for us.

I breathed and breathed and did feel some calmness enter in, though it was, as always, shot with a sense of loss. Loss and fear.

The thunder of false modesty was deafening.

In the 1970s, British food was beginning to get good, whereas in France it was just starting its long, sad decline. My most memorable meals, however, have been in Italy.

I'd never chosen to be alone, but that was the way things had turned out, and I'd grown used to it.

Life can be lived at a remove. You trade in futures, and then you trade in derivatives of futures. Banks make more money trading derivatives than they do trading actual commodities.