“I thought of how many places there are in the world that belong in this way to someone, who has it in his blood beyond anyone else's understanding.”

“I knew I belonged to the public and to the world, not because I was talented or even beautiful, but because I had never belonged to anything or anyone else.”

“People who understand context would be steamed to have someone else dictating how they can call it.”

“Anyone who has lost something they thought was theirs forever finally comes to realise that nothing really belongs to them.”

“I don't think anyone understands anyone's job … We all have the same hang-ups. I get jealous if I know Laurence is kissing someone else.”

“His great novel The Leopard (Il Gattopardo) has certainly enlarged my life – an unusual experience for a life which is well on in its eighties. Reading and rereading it has made me realize how many ways there are of being alive, how many doors there are, close to one, which someone else's touch may open.”

“He doesn't know what to make of me," Mat said softly.
"How very uncommon. I can't think of anyone else who has reacted that way to you, Mat.”

“She didn't know how to love, to give herself to someone, to out herself in someone else's keeping and take him into hers. She didn't trust anyone with her heart - or the darker places of her soul.”

“Now I understand. When you love someone, you have to try things even if they don't make sense to anyone else.”

“Anyone who has declared someone else to be an idiot, a bad apple, is annoyed when it turns out in the end that he isn't.”