“It is manifestly pregnant and has a bulging white belly heavy with its load of kittens.”

“What in heaven's name was the real essence of this beauty? Was it the precision of nature with its physical laws, or was it nature's mercilessness, ceaselessly resisting man's understanding?”

“It was perhaps relief and confidence stemming from the opportunity to tempt you into being my accomplice, however indirectly, in the lonely work of producing the mask. For me, whatever you may say, you are the most important "other person." No, I do not mean it in a negative sense. I meant that the one who must first restore the roadway, the one whose name I had to write on the first letter, was first on my list of "others." (Under any circumstances, I simply did not want to lose you. To lose you would be symbolic of losing the world.)”

“When I look at small things, I think I shall go on living: drops of rain, leather gloves shrunk by being wet...When I look at something too big, I want to die: the Diet Building, or a map of the world...”

“Будем каждое утро тщательно разглаживать любовь утюгом…”

“It was as if, without realizing it, I had been completely disarmed by her legs.”

“I personally feel that a box, far from being a dead end, is an entrance to another world. I don't know to where, but an entrance to somewhere, some other world.”