“Memory changes as a person matures.”

“The faculty of memory cannot be separated from the imagination. They go hand in hand. To one degree or another, we all invent our personal pasts. And for most of us those pasts are built from emotionally colored memories.”

“In effect, painting is the still memory of [the artist's] human motion, and our individual responses to it depend on who we are, on our character, which underlines the simple truth that no person leaves himself behind in order to look at a painting.”

“Memory is essential to who we are, and memories can be both implicit and explicit - unconscious and conscious.”

“Infancy is irretrievable. Its memories live underground. To what extent they return by stealth or are triggered by various catalysts remains an ongoing question.”

“Our memory fragments don't have any coherence until they're imagined in words. Time is a property of language, of syntax, and tense.”

“Great books are the ones that are urgent, life-changing, the ones that crack open the reader’s skull and heart.”