“Something I'm not ready to name works itself under the grip of Charlies death and loosens it, and keeps the nightmare at bay when I fall back asleep.”

“It was like being asleep when you were awake and awake when you were asleep. I'd pinch myself, figuratively speaking - I had to keep pinching myself. Then I'd wake up kind of in reverse; I'd go back to the nightmare I had to live in. And everything would be clear and reasonable.”

“Abbey: Did you speak to me in a different language? When I was in the hospital?Caspian: Something to keep the nightmares at bay. To let you know I was there. Tu sei una stella...la mia stella. It means 'You're a star. My star.”

“(Ravic speaking of a butterfly caught in the Louvre) In the morning it would search for flowers and life and the light honey of blossoms and would not find them and later it would fall asleep on millennial marble, weakened by then, until the grip of the delicate, tenacious feet loosened and it fell, a thin leaf of premature autumn.”

“Tereza had gone back to sleep; he could not. He pictured her death. She was dead and having terrible nightmares; but because she was dead, he was unable to wake her from them. Yes, that is death: Tereza asleep, having terrible nightmares, and he unable to wake her.”

“When I can't sleep, I always wrap something around my neck and close my eyes and imagine myself being strangled to death. Then I can fall asleep--it feels like sinking deep underwater”