Love is a very strange idea. I never know what it is. When you were young it seemed to be all intensity and no opportunity. Later when you did get th… - Bernard MacLaverty

If you have a war on your hands you send for the Mr Crillys of this world. The hard men and the bandits are the real revolutionaries, if you see what I mean. They get things done, they punch the hole for us to get through later.

On the wall above the desk was an ikon he had bought in Thessaloníki - he afterwards discovered that he had paid too much for it. It had been hanging for some months before he noticed, his attention focused by a moment of rare idleness, that Christ had a woodworm hole in the pupil of his left eye. It was inconspicuous by its position, and rather than detracting from the impact, he felt the ikon was enhanced by the authenticity of this small defect.

Violence is a bit like antibodies. Small doses build up until you can reject and be immune to the most horrific events.