“The Kugels, Kugel hated to admit, might just have to, in the event of genocide, rely on the kindness of strangers.Mother used to say: I can name six million people who relied on the kindness of strangers.”

“Hiding from genocide inside a Jew's attic, thought Kugel, is like hiding from a lion inside a gazelle.”

“I kind of like it up here, Kugel said. It's got a certain fatalistic charm, a certain je ne sais fucked.”

“So desperate was Kugel for things to turn out for the best, proclaimed Professor Jove, that he couldn't stop worrying about the worst. Hope, said Professor Jove, was Solomon Kugel's greatest failing.”

“Kugel set off, the wind in what would have been, some years ago, his hair.”

“Kugel was a firm believer that death was not always a bad thing - that life often reached such levels of crapitude that dying was preferable to living.”

“His intelligence only exacerbated the guilt Kugel felt for bringing him into the world. It was one thing to have condemned a child to life, that was criminal enough, but life was a sentence more easily served by fools.”