“And for her, now, replaced by the plain language of the dogs, who in a few syllables have everything to say.”

“I have not wanted syllables where actions have spoken so plainly.”

“Wamblecropt is the most exquisite word in the English language. Say it. Each syllable is intolerably beautiful.”

“I want to tell A Story, Every Story, everything all at once, not anything in particular that might be said through the words I know, and I try to roll all sounds into one, to accumulate more and more syllables, as if they might make a Möbius strip of language in which everything, everything is contained. There is a hidden rule even in this game, though - that the sounds have to resemble real syllables, that they can't disintegrate into brute noise, for then I wouldn't be talking at all. I want articulation - but articulation that says the whole world at once.”

“You can't replace one dog with another any more than you can replace one person with another, but that's not to say you shouldn't get more dogs and people in your life.”

“Earth is ancient now, but all knowledge is stored up in her. She keeps a record of everything that has happened since time began. Of time before time, she says little, and in a language that no one has yet understood. Through time, her secret codes have gradually been broken. Her mud and lava is a message from the past.Of time to come, she says much, but who listens?”