“I'm beginning to think that maybe it's not just how much you love someone. Maybe what matters is who you are when you're with them.”

“It is very difficult to live among people you love and hold back from offering them advice.”

“I've never quite believed that one chance is all I get”

“My cousin Roger once told me, on the eve of his third wedding, that he felt marriage was addictive. Then he corrected himself. I mean early marriage, he said. The very start of a marriage. It's lik...”

“Ah, God, it's barbaric, however you look at it,' he told Ruth.'What, cremation?' she asked.'Death.”

“The one ironclad rule is that I have to try. I have to walk into my writing room and pick up my pen every weekday morning.”

“When I say it's you I like, I'm talking about that part of you that knows that life is far more than anything you can ever see or hear or touch. That deep part of you that allows you to stand for t...”

“You know Balbec so well - do you have friends in the area?'I have friends wherever there are companies of trees, wounded but not vanquished, which huddle together with touching obstinacy to implore...”

“Things that matter are not easy. Feelings of happiness are easy. Happiness is not. Flirting is easy. Love is not. Saying youre friends is easy. Being friends is not.”

“work at our responsibility as parents as if everything in life counted on it, because in fact everything in life does count on it.”

“Happiness [is] only real when shared”

“That's what people do who love you. They put their arms around you and love you when you're not so lovable.”