“Anna Quangel wishes she could stroke her husband's hand, but she doesn't dare. She just brushes it, as if by accident, and says, 'Oh, sorry, Otto!' He looks at her in surprise, but doesn't say anything. They walk on.”

“It doesn't matter if she's deaf," he says, My aunty Demi can listen with her eyes, and whisper with her hands.”

“Somehow she lost her compass. Her engine failed. Her gyroscope broke. She's ... lost. She says the road she was on isn't there any more and she doesn't know where to walk now.”

“Anna had been preparing herself for this meeting, had thought what she would say to him, but she did not succeed in saying anything of it; his passion mastered her. She tried to calm him, to calm herself, but it was too late. His feeling infected her. Her lips trembled so that for a long while she could say nothing.”

“it's a little girl named anna, and she doesn't know if she's ready to say good-bye to a father she's never really said hello to.”

“Sometimes she wishes she could return to the naive happiness of their life. But mostly, she aches to go forward, to a place her body doesn't seem willing to take her.”