Violet wells

“You'd like to think the death of a person is like the death of a star, that it will enrich the cosmos with precious elements, with added meaning.”
― Glenn Haybittle, The War in Venice

“Not long ago, I caught myself experiencing a most incredible sensation. Leafing through a book on Hitler, I was touched by some of his portraits: they reminded me of my childhood. I grew up during the war; several members of my family perished in Hitler's concentration camps; but what were their deaths compared with the memories of a lost period in my life, a period that would never return?”
― Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being

“Venice is a Dorian Gray city. Somewhere up there in the world's attic, there's another place with the haggard, poxed and ravaged face of unspeakable evil. And I suspect it's Cardiff.”
― A.A. Gill, Table Talk

“Do we ever give anyone the gift they actually want?”
― Michael Cunningham, By Nightfall