“To persevere is always a reflection of the state of one's inner life, one's philosophy and one's perspective”

“The trick was to refuse to allow your pain to prevent you from living honorably. In Japan, she said, a person learned not to complain or be distracted by suffering. To persevere was always a reflection of the state of one’s inner life, one’s philosophy, and one’s perspective. It was best to accept old age, death, injustice, hardship – all of these were part of living”

“One thing has led to the next in my life, but like lines of a poem. I suppose I've thrown in my lot with love, and don't know any other way to go on breathing. ”

“Oh, to be young. To still be one's own hero.”

“Losing is like knowing that, in the movie scene where a thousand die but the hero lives, you're one of the obliterated.”

“Satellites can see your thoughts, but not through rock,' is like something they might say. In John William's case, it was conscious hyperbole and therefore commentary. At one level, it was reefer-inspired. It was partly for fun. It was other things, too-but not derangement. I give no credence to the interpretation, and I knew him better than anybody.”

“The snowfall obliterated the borders between the fields and made Kabuo Miyamoto's long-cherished seven acres indistinguishable from the land that surrounded them. All human claims to the landscape were superseded, made null and void by the snow. The world was one world, and the notion that a man might kill another over some small patch of it did not make sense.”