“We make our own truths and lies....Truths are often lies and lies truths...”

“I could never stop comparing the way it was with Gertrud and the way it had been with Hanna; again and again, Gertrud and I would hold each other, and I would feel that something was wrong, that sh...”

“Philosophy has forgotten about children”

“When he answered, he went all the way back to beginnings. He instructed me about the individual, about freedom and dignity, about the human being as subject and the fact that one may not turn him i...”

“As I looked and looked, the living face became visible in the dead, the young in the old. This is what must happen to old married couples, I thought: the young man is preserved in the old one for h...”

“They waited awhile before lighting the candles; the gloom allowed the past to slip cozily into the present. But the memories were of a time that was gone and didn't overshadow the present. But the ...”

“Remember, you are as dispensable as the most indispensable king of kings, the mighty lord of silly worldly men.”

“All of my best friends are dead people. Someday I've got to figure out how that happened.”

“She knew a thing she should have known all along: that dead people are like wax memory-you take them in your mind, you shape and squeeze them, push a bump here, stretch one out there, pull the body...”

“For every inch of skin, there is memory. Devils are so made. Saints, too, if you believe in them. His humanity has been broken as an old walking stick that once held up a crippled man named Thomas....”

“It frightens me that I can't do anything sensible about it.""Are you scared that you'll wind up with a boring job where you have to see the same people every day and drink instant coffee?""I'm more...”

“She'd be dead before the memories and pain were finally gone; she knew it, accepted it, and dealt with it.”