“In another Nabokov novel, The Real Life of Sebastian Knight, Sebastian's brother discovers two seemingly incongruous pictures in his dead brother's library: a pretty, curly-haired child playing with a dog and a Chinese man in the act of being beheaded. The two pictures remind us of the close relation between banality and brutality.”

“It was a brutal picture, a tug-of-war between two equal but opposing impulses. It had the ring of truth, however,”

“We are one now, little brother, you and I," Sebastian said. "We are one.”

“I could picture how Caprice was before we lost her. Dark hair, beautiful smile, intelligent hazel eyes, quick wit.Now gone.Just gone.Like a chessboard where suddenly one of the knights disappeared. A blank spot on the board of life that could never truly be replaced because no two things were alike, no two beings alike.”

“Jace: 'I don't like keeping her in the dark.'Sebastian: 'We'll tell her in a week. What difference does a week make?'Jace: 'Two weeks ago you were dead.'Sebastian: 'Well, I wasn't suggesting twoweeks. That would be insane.”

“Lindsey and I would lie down on the floor underneath it. I would pretend to be the knight that was pictured, and Holiday was the faithful dog curled up at his feet. Lindsey would be the wife he’d left behind. It always dissolved into giggles no matter how solemn the start. Lindsey would tell the dead knight that a wife had to move on, that she couldn’t be trapped for the rest of her life by a man who was frozen in time. ....“You’re dead, knight,” she would say. “Time to move on.”