“The ritual works. The forms overcome doubts. We have learned over the centuries to weave meaning around emptiness and pain. A meaning and a pattern. We have been practising that for a very long time.”

“Words and form! We have a totally clear view of the world when we're fourteen years old, maybe sooner. But then we need another fifty years in order to create a language that can express those impressions. And in the mean time, of course, they've faded away.”

“Everybody must have a story. For those who don't, we need to invent one.”

“The dead are older than the living, he thought. Irrespective of how old they were when they passed over to the other side, they have experienced something which makes them older than any living thing.”

“There are reasons for everything we do.”

“We are closer to the end of the world than to that minute that has just passed by, because that is lost forever.”

“The living must look after one another, he thought. The worst possible outcome is to die without having lived.”