“The telling of a story, like virtually everything in this life, was always made all the easier by a cup of tea.”

“--a drive in the country, an expedition to a shoe shop a quiet cup of tea under a cloudless sky; each of us had something that made it easier to continue in a world that sometimes, just sometimes, was not as we might wish it to be.”

“It is sometimes easier to be happy if you don't know everything.”

“A life without stories would be no life at all. And stories bound us, did they not, one to another, the living to the dead, people to animals, people to the land?”

“Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni was not a lazy man, but it was remarkable to reflect how most men imagined that things like tea and food would simply appear if they waited long enough. There would always be a woman in the background--a mother, a girlfriend, a wife--who would ensure that those needs would be met.”

“There were two classes of persons upon whom a duty of virtually absolute confidentiality rested: doctors and lovers.”

“Tea, for me, is one of the great subjects. It is a romatic trade, it does not pollute excessively, it has all sorts of health benefits, it calms and wakes you up at the same time.”