Death is woven in with the violets,” said Louis. “Death and again death.”)

We insist, it seems, on living.

No, I'm not clever. I've always cared more for people than for ideas.

I feel that by writing I am doing what is far more necessary than anything else.

She fell into a deep pool of sticky water, which eventually closed over her head. She saw nothing and heard nothing but a faint booming sound, which was the sound of the sea rolling over her head. While all her tormentors thought that she was dead, she was not dead, but curled up at the bottom of the sea.

What a comfort is friendship in this world.

My own brain is to me the most unaccountable of machinery - always buzzing, humming, soaring roaring diving, and then buried in mud. And why? What's this passion for?