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1. black
2. grey
3. blue
4. red
5. brown
6. white

Life is a peephole, a single tiny entry onto a vastness–how can I not dwell on this brief, cramped view of things? This peephole is all I’ve got!

Yann Martel

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More Yann Martel Quotes

• 

  Why make dirty what is beautiful, spoil what is perfect? Love.

  YANN MARTEL
  BeautifulBeautyDirty
• 

  We are all born like Catholics, aren’t we—in limbo, without religion, until some figure introduces us to God?

  YANN MARTEL
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• 

  I wept like a child. It was not because I was overcome at having survived my ordeal, though I was. Nor was it the presence of my brothers and sisters, though that too was very moving.

  YANN MARTEL
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• 

  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
  GoHeartLettingOtherwiseWords
• 

  Faith in God is an opening up, a letting go, a deep trust, a free act of love – but sometimes it was so hard to love.

  YANN MARTEL
  FaithGoGodLettingOpeningUp
• 

  If you took the city of Tokyo and turned it upside down and shook it you would be amazed at the animals that fall out: badgers, wolves, boa constrictors, crocodiles, ostriches, baboons, capybaras, wild boars, leopards, manatees, ruminants, in untold numbers.

  YANN MARTEL
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• 

  The worst pair of opposites is boredom and terror. Sometimes your life is a pendulum swing from one to the other.

  YANN MARTEL
  BoredomOppositesSwings
• 

  Afterwards, when it’s all over, you meet God. What do you say to God?

  YANN MARTEL
  AfrerwardsGodOver
• 

  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
  BookLifeNamesSometimes
• 

  India is a place where all stories are possible. You forget that the imagination can take hold of anything and contemplate it and love it and describe it.

  YANN MARTEL
  CountryImaginationLovePossible
• 

  As much as I love movies, it would be presumptuous of me to think that I know how to make one.

  YANN MARTEL
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• 

  There is nothing more satisfying than having a sentence fall into place in a way you feel is right, and then adding another one and then another one. It’s extraordinarily satisfying.

  YANN MARTEL
  FallFeelsSentenceWay
• 

  War subjects itself to transportation in a way that we find acceptable.

  YANN MARTEL
  TransportationWarWay
• 

  I did not count the days or the weeks or the months. Time is an illusion that only makes us pant. I survived because I forgot even the very notion of time.

  YANN MARTEL
  IllusionMonthsWeek
• 

  I am not a particularly natural writer. I am not a person who can write in paragraphs the way some writers do. For me, it’s sentence by sentence, sometimes word-by-word. And I revise constantly. It’s a very laborious process, but I love doing it.

  YANN MARTEL
  LaboriousProcessSometimesWayWriting
• 

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

  YANN MARTEL
  DeathbedLightSelfWhite