“For too long I have played on the stage of lucidity, and I have lost. Now I need to accustom my eyes to the falling darkness. I need to contemplate the natural slumber of all things, which the ligh...”

“I've always believed that the only defeats and victories that matter in life are those you lose or win alone, against yourself.”

“I have always believed it my right to have a locked door between me and the world, and to hold the key myself. Now look at it, kicked open. The doors are off their hinges, the portals unguarded, ev...”

“I embraced her and she did not object at all. She let herself be kissed and kissed back, but coolly, without conviction, absently, as if she were smoking a cigarette.”

“What an odd thing a stranger is. A stranger sleeping next to you. I listen to his breathing as if it were his entire life, with its hidden processes, the pulsing of the blood in the tissues, with t...”

“A stranger sleeps next to me, like a stone beside another stone.”

“You need to understand that you are not your appearance or your body”

“Women do not give a very favorable estimate of their appearance”

“It is complexes that prevent women with a good appearance from adequately assessing themselves”

“A man with a beard was always a little suspect anyway. You couldn't say you wore a beard because you liked a beard. People didn't like you for telling the truth. You had to say you had a scar so yo...”

“Only beards can't make you count as a man, you need to have respect for women in your heart for that.”

“All the real blokes I know are obsessed with cars and have started doing cycling at the weekend and being really, really boring about it and banging on about their Fitbits and growing stupid beards...”

“Mrs. Reed grabbed Kayla's wrist. "Good. You haven't gotten that damned tattoo. Whatever you do, don't let them make you get it.”