Ben Scobie

“What really knocks me out is a book that, when you're all done reading it, you wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it. That doesn't happen much, though.”
― J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye

“A man who aspires to rise above the mediocre, to be something more than the ordinary, surely deserves admiration, even if he fails and loses a fortune on account of his ambitions
(...)
if one has failed only where others have not had the courage or will to try, there is consolation - indeed, deep satisfaction - to be gained from his observation when looking back over one's life.”
― Kazuo Ishiguro, An Artist of the Floating World

“After awhile you could get used to anything.”
― Albert Camus, The Stranger

“I opened myself to the gentle indifference of the world.”
― Albert Camus, L'Étranger