“The face of the dead man was concealed, of course, our customs not being those of the south, where corpses are carried to the grave in open coffins, that they might – one last time before slipping into the pit – be warmed by the light of the sun.”

“Our wisdom is slavish prejudice, our customs consist in control,constraint, compulsion. Civilised man is born and dies a slave.The infant is bound up in swaddling clothes, the corpse is naileddown in his coffin. All his life long man is imprisoned by ourinstitutions.”

“We carry the dead in our handsas we might carry water - with a careful,reverential tread.There is no other way.How easily, how easily their faces spill.”

“all those nights with the phone warming the side of my face like the sun.”

“The day before is what we bring to the day we're actually living through, life is a matter of carrying along all those days-before just as someone might carry stones, and when we can no longer cope with the load, the work is done, the last day is the only one that is not the day before another day.”

“Three points for the dead slowly prising open the lids of their coffins. They want to hunt the living. They can't stop. Their throats have turned to liquid and their fingers glint under the weak autumn sun.”