Quotes from Steven Galloway

Most argument, and in fact most conflict, has nothing to do with the present. It's always about the past or the future. People can't agree on the details of what has happened or is going to happen. But we rarely know what has happened, and we never know what is going to happen. What is really at dispute is how we will deal with not knowing.

Because civilization isn't a thing that you build and then there it is, you have it forever. It needs to be built constantly, re-created daily.

This is how she now believes life happens. One small thing at a time. A series of inconsequential junctions, any or none of which can lead to salvation or disaster. There are no grand moments where a person does or does not perform the act that defines their humanity. There are only moments that appear, briefly, to be this way.

Because civilization isn't a thing that you build and then there it is, you have it forever. It needs to be built constantly, re-created daily. It

An explosion groans to the west of them, and Arrow involuntarily looks in the direction of the sound. Nermin, who hasn't looked, smiles. 'I think they're trying to send us a message.' 'What is the message?' she asks as another shell lands in the same area. Nermin shrugs. 'I don't know. I'm making a special effort not to listen.

There must come a point where so much has been turned to rubble that ruining a little more makes no difference. It's possible that point has already been reached. Does a person work the same way?

The cellist confuses her. She doesn't know what he hopes to achieve with his playing. He can't believe he will stop the war. He can't believe he will save lives. Perhaps he has gone insane,

But Arrow believes they took these names so they could separate themselves from what they had to do, so the person who fought and killed could someday be put away.

He thinks of Mrs. Ristovski. He doesn't know what made her the way she is, but something has killed her, he can see now that she is a ghost as well. She has been a ghost for a long time. And to be a ghost while you're still alive is the worst thing he can imagine.

The choices she's made have left her without choice. There's

luck or fate or whatever it is that decides who lives and who doesn't has not,

Surely she wouldn't die if she went a few days without water. It might teach her a lesson. It's a pleasing but pointless thought. As much as he might regret it, she was right, he made her a promise.

He will behave now as he hopes everyone will someday behave. Because civilization isn't a thing that you build and then there it is, you have it forever. It needs to be built constantly, re-created daily. It vanishes far more quickly than he ever would have thought possible. And if he wishes to live, he must do what he can to prevent the world he wants to live in from fading away. As long as there's war, life is a preventative measure.

Albinoni's Adagio in G Minor

I'm afraid of everything, of dying, of not dying. I'm afraid that it will stay like this forever, that this war isn't a war, but just how life will be.

Being a parent is a monumental thing. You shape reality for another person. You cannot be an illusion. You cannot be paralyzed by the fear that you are an illusion. If you have done a bad job, or no job at all, what remains of you is proof that the world is an unfeeling place. If you have done a good job, what remains is the part of you that was magical.

If people are going to be taken away from him, either through death or a transformation of their personality that makes them into strangers, then he's better off without them.

It was a bright, clear day, and the car felt alive to her, as though the way she and the car moved together was a sort of destiny, and everything was happening exactly as it ought to.

When the world thought of Sarajevo, it was as a place of murder. It isn't clear to him how the world will think of the city now that thousands have been murdered. He suspects that what the world wants most is not to think of it all.

I will not live in a city where dead bodies lie abandoned in the streets, and you will not tell the world I do.