Date: 1975

"In the years that followed he set about replenishing his mind, but it was never quite the same. The sense of purpose was lacking--there was no great Reckoning against which he could hoard his knowledge, so that it tended to leak away as fast as he acquired it."

— Lodge, David (b. 1935)

Date: November 22, 1990

"I do not feel alive, except insofar as a stream of feeling -- perceiving, imagining, remembering, reflecting, revising, recategorizing runs through me."

— Sacks, Oliver (b. 1933)

Date: 1992

"After a while, he no longer recognized what he was thinking and, just as a shop window sometimes prevents the onlooker from seeing the objects behind the glass and folds him instead in a narcissistic embrace, his mind ignored the flow of impressions from the outside world and locked him into a d...

— Edward St. Aubyn (b. 1960)

Date: 1992

"Only behind a waterfall of brutal and pleasurable sensations, thought Patrick, accepting the leather-clad menu without bothering to glance up, could he hide from the bloodhounds of his conscience. . There, in the cool recess of the rock, behind that heavy white veil, he would hear them yelping a...

— Edward St. Aubyn (b. 1960)

Date: 1992

"Or--he must stop thinking about it--or [his consciousness seemed] like a solution of saturated copper sulphate under the microscope, when it suddenly transforms and crystals break out everywhere on its surface."

— Edward St. Aubyn (b. 1960)

Date: 1992

"Traces of the night's possession surfaced now and again in the slowly simmering scum of his thoughts, and the experience of being so thoroughly and often displaced left him bruised and lonely."

— Edward St. Aubyn (b. 1960)

Date: 1992

"His thoughts shimmered like a hesitating stream, gathering into pools of discrete and vivid imagery."

— Edward St. Aubyn (b. 1960)

Date: 2000

"'I must have done,' I said, feeling the memory of another dozen books slide down Lethe's greasy banks."

— Edward St. Aubyn (b. 1960)

Date: 2000

"He hadn't yet organised his memories of the conference into anecdote and he knew that unless he gave them that structure they would slip down the nearest drain."

— Edward St. Aubyn (b. 1960)

Date: 2000

"I fell silent, my mood shattered like the waves exploding on the coast below."

— Edward St. Aubyn (b. 1960)