Her general drift was clear enough: we were all very special, being Ha — Kazuo Ishiguro

"If you go to Tokyo, I think it becomes very obvious that theres this almost seamless mixture of popular culture and Japanese traditional culture."

"I have a sense of having just left without saying goodbye, and of this whole other world just kind of fading away. … I have the feeling of this completely alternative person I should have become. There was another life that I might have had, but I am having this one."

"What is this gallery? Why should she have a gallery of things done by us?"

"Maybe she sells them. Outside, out there."

"My donors have always tended to do much better than expected."

"More fundamentally, Im interested in memory because its a filter through which we see our lives, and because its foggy and obscure, the opportunities for self-deception are there. In the end, as a writer, Im more interested in what people tell themselves happened rather than what actually happened."

"How seldom, Friend! a good great man inherits Honour or wealth, with all his worth and pains! It sounds like stories from the land of spirits, If any man obtain that which he merits, Or any merit that which he obtains.   . For shame, dear Friend! renounce this canting strain! … Greatness and goodness are not means, but ends! Hath he not always treasures, always friends, The good great man? Three treasures, and , And , regular as infants breath; And three firm friends, more sure than day and night, , his , and the Angel ."

"He who loves is not ashamed before men of what he does for God, neither does he hide it through shame though the whole world should condemn it."

"Shamino: (when the player clicks repeatedly on a cat) Bloody cats!"

"A cloud was on the mind of men, and wailing went the weather, Yea, a sick cloud upon the soul when we were boys together. Science announced nonentity and art admired decay; The world was old and ended: but you and I were gay; Round us in antic order their crippled vices came — Lust that had lost its laughter, fear that had lost its shame."

"And then it happened. Suddenly, shamelessly, and without warning, as it must in all musical comedies, they were struck by... a love song."

"Prisoner in Castle British dungeon: "Shamino, speak up man!"