Life on a lifeboat isn't much of a life.

In a healthy individual, a broken bone that has healed properly is strongest where it was once broken. You have not lost any life, Henry told himself. You will still get your fair share of years. Yet the quality of his life changed. Once you've been struck by violence, you acquire companions that never leave you entirely: Suspicion, Fear, Anxiety, Despair, Joylessness. The natural smile is taken from you and the natural pleasures you once enjoyed lose their appeal.

Fiction and nonfiction are not so easily divided. Fiction may not be real, but it's true; it goes beyond the garland of facts to get to emotional and psychological truths.

He's a shy man. Life has taught him not to show off what is most precious to him.

You can get used to anything - haven't I already said that? Isn't that what all survivors say?

My suffering left me sad and gloomy.

In art, something comes of nothing. Out of the thin air and the ether, you create a story. And that is intensely satisfying.