Japan

there were great chasms beneath words, between two or sometimes more languages, that could open up without warning.

John Updike’s The Centaur,

In the act of praise, there is the aspect of it being “the passing of judgment by a person of ability on a person of no ability.”

The beauty of Basho’s prose, however, took the negative aspects of old age, loneliness, and death and imbued them with a serene sense of beauty.

When you say you believe, you allow the possibility of disappointment. And from disappointment or betrayal, there may come despair. Such is the way of the mind.

As I developed into a youth and young adult, I came to realize that I shouldn’t be just a good kid, that I should look at things with my own eyes and have independent ideas. This led me to attempt to turn my back on even my fundamental purity as a child and, combined with the dark time of studying for entrance exams, I came to draw nihilistic

After a long search, I finally found the flashlight lying about three feet from where I had landed. The moment my hand touched its plastic casing was one of the happiest of my life. But I didn’t switch it on right away. Instead, I closed my eyes and took a number of deep breaths. As if I were patiently unraveling a stubborn knot. My breathing

And it was the kind of thing that loses the most important nuances when reduced to words.