“A novel is a mirror walking down a road”

“The first sentence of every novel should be: Trust me, this will take time but there is order here, very faint, very human.”

“Some people you just had to embrace, in some way or another, had to bite into the muscle, to remain sane in their company. You needed to grab their hand and clutch it like a downer so they would pull you into their midst. Otherwise they, walking casually down the street towards you, almost about to wave, would leap over a wall and be gone for months.”

“All I desired was to walk upon such an earth that had no maps.”

“So the books for the Englishman, as he listened intently or not, hadgaps of plot like sections of a road washed out by storms, missingincidents as if locusts had consumed a section of tapestry, as ifplaster loosened by the bombing had fallen away from a mural at night.”

“He came to this country like a torch on fire and he swallowed air as he walked forward and he gave out light”

“When we are young we do not look into mirrors. It is when we are old, concerned with our name, our legend, what our lives will mean to the future. We become vain with the names we own, our claims to have been the first eyes, the strongest army, the cleverest merchant. It is when he is old that Narcissus wants a graven image of himself.”