"It is incredible how essential to me you have become. I suppose you are accustomed to people saying these things. Damn you, spoilt creature; I shan't make you love me any the more by giving myself away like this — But oh my dear, I can't be clever and stand-offish with you: I love you too much for that. Too truly. You have no idea how stand-offish I can be with people I don't love. I have brought it to a fine art. But you have broken down my defences. And I don't really resent it."

"There is no example of a country that is successful if its people are divided based on religion or ethnicity. If you look at the Middle East right now and the chaos that’s taking place in a place like…"

"Actually there were a lot of people like Tara-May in Hollywood, maybe even most people were; everybody had something they “really” did. Drivers wrote, bartenders acted; she’d had massages from a girl …"

"The mirror by the door was not a mirror by the door, it was an altar where he stood for only a moment to put on his cap before going out. The red rocking chair was a rocking of his own hips as he sat …"

"The sunlight claps the earth, and the moonbeams kiss the sea: what are all these kissings worth, if thou kiss not me?"