“Die Belohnung für Langeweile sind Sicherheit und Geborgenheit.”

“Selbst die Verwandten der Berühmten [sind] berühmt, denn Ruhm [ist] erblich.”

“For Mum, life was fundamentally hell. You went blind, you got raped, people forgot your birthday, Nixon got elected, your husband fled with a blonde from Beckenham, and then you got old, you couldn't walk and you died.”

“قد علمتني الحياة أنه حين يراك الآخرون متحمساً، تفتر حماستهم هم، والعكس صحيح . لذا كلما ازدادت رغبتي بأمر ما، تصنّعت بروداً أعظم حياله .”

“Intreurig is deze avond, want ik ga weg en kom niet meer terug.”

“The vocation of each writer is to describe the world as he or she sees it; anything more than that is advertising.”

“Yet velvet curtains, soft cheese, compelling work and boys who can run full-tilt—it isn't enough. And if it isn't, it isn't. There's no living with that. The world is made from our imagination; our eyes enliven it, as our hands give it shape. Wanting makes it thrive; meaning is what you put in, not what you extract. You only see what you are inclined to see, and no more. We have to make the new.”