“I can't help it either, the laughing: solemn gatherings, slowballads, pompous orations, any person or occasion that assumes I'lloffer my unreserved respect: I tend to find them all hysterical in theend. Especially if someone similar is there to set me off. They don'thave to do much: I recognize what it looks like when somebody'scomposure starts to strip itself away. They'll maybe cross their armswith that twitchy, shaky, tension, or they'll grab down little wheezesof embarrassed air, or they'll simply hood their faces under theirpalm, trying to hide how fast they're slipping, how fast *we're*slipping, because I'll be weakening with them by then, I'll be just aslost, pulled equally tight against the moment when we both stop caringand let it disgrace us -- when we laugh.”

“Perhaps i am a masochist.No. Not Possible. If I were basically a masochist then most of my life would have been just nothing but concentrated fun. Every time I woke up, bleeding from my heart and soul, I’d find myself barely able to hide my joy.”

“We are not all connected. We are bags of skin. We are all separate bags of thinking skin.”

“Writers' trousers are famously unpredictable in many ways, but I haven't met another author whose trousers simply disintegrated en route to a reading. There I was, young and nervous and not wearing a frock due to poor body image issues, stuck on a late afternoon train, leafing through my notes in a preparatory way and yet also feeling, somehow, chilly.”

“The right wrist, because I'm right-handed - so that must be the one that's done most wrong. Although, now that I think, my sins have mostly been ambidextrous.”

“Read. As much as you can. As deeply and widely and nourishingly and ­irritatingly as you can. And the good things will make you remember them, so you won't need to take notes.”

“A good roast of sun, it slows you, lets you relax–and out here if there's anything wrong, you can see it coming with bags of time to do what's next. This is the place and the weather for peace, for the cultivation of a friendly mind.”