“But who is ever able to apply to her own current love affair a word like "similar"?”

“The word "miss" is so wistful. As is the word "wistful," for that matter. They both have sighs embedded in them, that "iss" sound. Which also sounds like if.”

“A love story - your own, or anyone else's - is interior, hidden. It can never be accurately reported, only imagined. It is all dreams and invention. It's guesswork.”

“It's Violent.You imagine it deafening, red, boiling-hot. It's like a comic book: the bright colors, the crude outlines, the words in capital letters: BANG!SMASH!CRUNCH! You think "smithereens."You crave the explosion.”

“And while some healing does happen, it isn't a healing of redemption or epiphany. It's more like the slow absorption of a bruise.”

“Those moments of knowing are sharp and merciless, but then they fade out, like stars when the sky gets light in the morning. You know, and then you don't know.”

“Time and judgment collaborate to produce farce, and farce in turn contains much truth; major characters upon the stage may turn out to be lackeys in disguise, while the figures we have overlooked in the midst of the frenetic action unmask and reveal themselves as divinities. (160)”