Haruki Murakami, Kafka on the Shore

"When someone is trying very hard to get something, they don't. And when they're running away from something as hard as they can, it usually catches up with them."

"Being with her I feel a pain, like a frozen knife stuck in my chest. An awful pain, but the funny thing is I'm thankful for it. It's like that frozen pain and my very existence are one.The pain is an anchor, mooring me here."

"Memories warm you up from the inside. But they also tear you apart."

"The sense of tragedy - according to Aristotle - comes, ironically enough, not from the protagonist's weak points but from his good qualities. Do you know what I'm getting at? People are drawn deeper into tragedy not by their defects but by their virtues....[But] we accept irony through a device called metaphor. And through that we grow and become deeper human beings."

"Love can rebuild the world, they say, so everything's possible when it comes to love."