53 Quotes by Per Petterson

There are some things with alcohol you must never do. You must never drink alone, never drink on Sundays, never drink before seven o’clock and if you do, it has to be on a Saturday.

She looks at me, this is not what she had expected, she sniffs at the food and only slowly starts to eat, swallows each mouthful with demonstrative gloom, and then turns to look at me again, a long look, with those eyes, sighs and goes on, as if she were emptying the poisoned chalice. Spoiled dog.

But life had shifted its weight from one point to another, from one leg to the other, like a silent giant in the vast shadows against the ridge, and I did not feel like the person I had been when this day began, and I did not even know if that was something to be sorry for.

It was as if gravity was suspended. It was like dancing, I thought, although I had never danced in my whole life. We were never to walk like that again.

Oh, well, we did have a good day out together, you and I, that doesn’t happen every day, does it?

I was perfectly calm, I was the anchor of the world.

I hate plots.

1989 was such a very, very important year in Europe. The wall fell, the Soviet Union was crumbling, and so many things happened - in 15 minutes, the world changed.