“We live" writes Pursewarden somewhere, "lives based upon selected fictions. Our view of reality is conditioned by our position in space and time - not by our personalities as we like to think. Thus every interpretation of reality is based upon a unique position. Two paces east or west and the whole picture is changed.”

“Art—the meaning of the pattern of our common actions in reality. The cloth-of-gold that hides behind the sackcloth of reality, forced out by the pain of human memory.”

“Does not everything depend on our interpretation of the silence around us?”

“We should tackle reality in a slightly jokey way, otherwise we miss its point.”

“I don’t believe one reads to escape reality. A person reads to confirm a reality he knows is there, but which he has not experienced.”

“I have decided to leave Clea’s last letter un-answered. I no longer wish to coerce anyone, to make promises, to think of life in terms of compacts, resolutions, covenants. It will be up to Clea to interpret my silence according to her own needs and desires, to come to me if she has need or not, as the case may be. Does not everything depend on our interpretation of the silence around us?”

“What are stars but points in the body of God where we insert the healing needles of our terror and longing?”