“Into this life of cruel wonder sent,Without a word to tell us what it meant,Sent back again without a reason why -Birth, life, and death - 'twas all astonishment.”

“Life rises out of death, death rises out of life; in being opposite they yearn to each other, they give birth to each other and are forever reborn. And with them, all is reborn, the flower of the apple tree, the light of the stars. In life is death. In death is rebirth. What then is life without death? Life unchanging, everlasting, eternal?-What is it but death-death without rebirth?”

“There were some days that deserved to be drowned at birth and everyone sent back to bed with a hot brandy, a box of chocolates and a warm, energetic companion. Today was without question one of those days.”

“If there was a hell beyond what he knew, he would welcome it. He had no reason not to.After all, a life without living was simply a death without dying. What more was there to fear or hate but life, endless life, with no respite?”

“the writer:"a spy sent into life by the forces of death. His main objective is to get the information across the border, back into death. Then he can be given a mythic personality: 'he spent time among us, betrayed us, and took the material across the border.”

“They wouldn’t even lift a finger to save their own grandmothers from the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal without orders signed in triplicate, sent in, sent back, queried, lost, found, subjected to public inquiry, lost again, and finally buried in soft peat for three months and recycled as firelighters.”