If it was Europe that gave us on the coast some idea of our history, it was Europe, I feel, that also introduced us to the lie.

That element of surprise is what I look for when I am writing. It is my way of judging what I am doing - which is never an easy thing to do.

The world is what it is; men who are nothing, who allow themselves to become nothing, have no place in it.

One isn’t born one’s self. One is born with a mass of expectations, a mass of other people’s ideas – and you have to work through it all.

Most people are not really free. They are confined by the niche in the world that they carve out for themselves. They limit themselves to fewer possibilities by the narrowness of their vision.

It is wrong to have an ideal view of the world. That's where the mischief starts. That's where everything starts unravelling.

The only lies for which we are truly punished are those we tell ourselves.

Home is, I suppose just a child's idea. A house at night, and a lamp in the house. A place to feel safe.

One always writes comedy at the moment of deepest hysteria.

The world is always in movement.

All the details of the life and the quirks and the friendships can be laid out for us, but the mystery of the writing will remain. No amount of documentation, however fascinating, can take us there.

Sometimes you have to fight for the past and sometimes you have to let go.

Why am I fixated on that man? I don't want to realise that now. That I want him to love me. I want him to love me. I want him to love me so much I could die.

Our fatigue is often caused not by work, but by worry, frustration and resentment.

The vampire is an outsider. He's the perfect metaphor for those things. He's someone who looks human and sounds human, but is not human, so he's always on the margins.

There was a young lady named Bright, Whose speed was far faster than light; She set out one day In a relative way, And returned on the previous night.

"There might simply be nothing going on that might activate it. Perhaps there isn't anything here that Alec is afraid of." Magnus glanced at Alec and raised his eyebrows. "Boo."

Everything I need to know is revealed to me. Everything I need comes to me. All is well in my life.

As he looked at me, he seemed to send a message of his own: that he would still fight for me, that he would fight until he collapsed to keep them from taking me.

He had her in his heart, but not always in his mind.