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It is true that those we meet can change us, sometimes so profoundly that we are not the same afterwards, even unto our names.

Yann Martel

The idea of a flip book still really appeals to me. That idea of fiction and non-fiction.
YANN MARTEL

Book Fiction Ideas
I wept heartily over this poor little deceased soul. It was the first sentient being I had ever killed. I was now a killer. I was now as guilty as Cain. I was sixteen years old, a harmless boy, bookish and religious, and now I had blood on my hands. It’s a terrible burden to carry. All sentient life is sacred.
YANN MARTEL

Blood Boys Religious
Life will defend itself no matter how small it is.
YANN MARTEL

Defend Matter Small
You must take life the way it comes at you and make the best of it.
YANN MARTEL

Cheer Graduation Inspiring
In a healthy individual, a broken bone that has healed properly is strongest where it was once broken. You have not lost any life, Henry told himself. You will still get your fair share of years. Yet the quality of his life changed.
YANN MARTEL

Broken Properly Taken Years
I can’t live for more than four years outside of Canada. I’m Canadian, so ultimately that is my reference point.
YANN MARTEL

Country Four People Years
It’s important in life to conclude things properly. Only then can you let go. Otherwise you are left with words you should have said but never did, and your heart is heavy with remorse.
YANN MARTEL

Go Heart Letting Otherwise Words
Zoo is an artificial territory, an approximation. Civilization is our natural territory.
YANN MARTEL

Civilization Territory Zoos
Life is an interpretation of a series of facts, and that interpretation is really what life is about. So the division between non-fiction and fiction has a certain logic, but it’s a very limited one. And by and large, it isn’t helpful.
YANN MARTEL

Division Facts Fiction Helpful Large
There is no doubt in my mind that that feral giraffes and feral hippos have been living in Tokyo for generations without seeing a soul.
YANN MARTEL

Generations Seeing Shock Soul
If you stumble about believability, what are you living for? Love is hard to believe, ask any lover. Life is hard to believe, ask any scientist. God is hard to believe, ask any believer. What is your problem with hard to believe?
YANN MARTEL

Believe Life Love
I can well imagine an athiest’s last words: “White, white! L-L-Love! My God!” – and the deathbed leap of faith.
YANN MARTEL

Deathbed Light Self White
We don’t want any invention. We want the ‘straight facts,’ as you say in English.” Isn’t telling about something–using words, English or Japanese–already something of an invention? Isn’t just looking upon this world already something of an invention?
YANN MARTEL

Country Invention Language People Some Something
I was not wounded in any part of my body, but I had never experienced such intense pain, such a ripping of the nerves, such an ache of the heart.
YANN MARTEL

Heart Nerves Pain
Much hostile and aggressive behaviour among animals is the expression of social insecurity.
YANN MARTEL

Animal Expression Insecurity
Life and death live and die in exactly the same spot, the body. It is from there that both babies and cancers are born.
YANN MARTEL

Baby Cancer Death Life

It is true that those we meet can change us, sometimes so profoundly that we are not the same afterwards, even unto our names.

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It is true that those we meet can change us, sometimes so profoundly that we are not the same afterwards, even unto our names.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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