“They watched the elk gallop and mull about like a new texture being laid, and their presence against the mountains in that high sweet grass was a trellis alive and for a moment it seemed as if the world was reinventing itself and the boy was filled with an inexplicable hope.”

“The Consul felt a pang. Ah, to have a horse, and gallop away, singing, to someone you loved perhaps, into the heart of all the simplicity and peace in the world; was that not like the opportunity afforded man by life itself? Of course not. Still, just for a moment, it had seemed that it was.”

“I think that real friendship always makes us feel such sweet gratitude, because the world almost always seems like a very hard desert, and the flowers that grow there seem to grow against such high odds.”

“For the introvert, as for the flâneur, observing is not a fallback position—something we do because we can’t participate. We watch because we want to. There is something wonderfully grounding about remaining still as others mull about—or mulling about while others remain still. Against the backdrop of the scene, the introvert feels more like an “I.”

“In New York, the buildings are like mountains in some ways, but they are only alive because of the people living in them. Real mountains are alive all over.”

“Being dead filled her beyond fulfillment. Like a fruit suffused with its own mystery and sweetness, she was filled with her vast death, which was so new, she could not understand that it had happened.”