[Smiley contemplates graffiti:]'Punk is destructive. Society does not need it.' The assertion caused him a moment's indecision. 'Oh, but society does… - John le Carré

He knew then what it was that Liz had given him; the thing that he would have to go back and find if ever he got home to England; it was the caring about little things - the faith in ordinary life; the simplicity that made you break up a bit of bread into a paper bag, walk down to the beach and throw it to the gulls. It was this respect for triviality which he had never been allowed to possess; whether it was bread of the seagulls or love

I read a story once about a poet who bathed himself in cold fountains so that he could recognise his own existence in the contrast.

We were both hybrids: I by birth, he by education. We had both taken too many steps away from the country that had borne us to belong anywhere with ease.