“He did not defy convention: when it did not interfere with whatever line of conduct he meant to pursue he conformed to it; and when it did he ignored it, affably conceding to his critics their right to censure him, if they felt so inclined, and caring neither for their praise nor their blame.”

“He was a man whose calmness reflected his confidence that he meant whatever he did-- which is different... from confidence that whatever he did was right.”

“He let his mouth linger on mine, neither possessively nor sweetly... like his mouth just belonged there on mine. And he was right. It did. It always had.”

“He knew he was alive when he was with her, whatever the devil that meant.Whatever the devil it did mean, it made all the difference.And he was not even sure what that meant.”

“What was after the universe? Nothing. But was there anything round the universe to show where it stopped before the nothing place began? It could not be a wall; but there could be a thin line there all round everything.[...]It pained him that he did not know well what politics meant and that he did not know where the universe ended. He felt small and weak. When would he be like the fellows in poetry and rhetoric?”

“When I first met him, he did not care if a friend did not fit into his world, because at that time his world had not been born yet.”