“He never went out without a book under his arm, and he often came back with two.”

“I think we should break up,” I told him.“Jesus, you’re a pain in the ass,” he muttered and went back to his book.“Seriously, Vance.”“Shut up, Jules,” he said without taking his eyes from his book.”

“Then he went out without touching anything and put his arm around Ingeborg, and like that, with their arms around each other, they returned to the village while the whole past of the universe fell on their heads.”

“...he enclosed pieces of string that he used to measure out his body--his head, thigh, forearm, finger, neck, everything. He wanted me to sleep with them under my pillow. He said that when he came back, we would remeasure his body against the string as proof that he hadn't changed.”

“And when he came to, he was flat on his back on the beach in the freezing sand, and it was raining out of a low sky, and the tide was way out.”

“He who does not know how to look back at where he came from will never get to his destination.”