The Translator Quotes

“This is the enemy, what is irreversible, what has already reached the farthest of places. There is no going back. They can bomb bus-loads of tourists, burn the American flag, but they are not shooting the enemy. It is already with them, inside them, what makes them resentful, defensive, what makes them no longer confident of their vision of the world.”
― Leila Aboulela, The Translator

“It took him years to learn the value of silence, the power of carefully chosen words.”
― Leila Aboulela, The Translator

“Loneliness is Europe's malaria," Rae said. "No one can really be immune.”
― Leila Aboulela, The Translator

“Somewhere hidden away was the culmination of the serious shopping of the past weeks, trees, turkeys, families sitting on settees. Like in the pictures she has seen in magazines. Private people, she thought, made private by the cold.”
― Leila Aboulela, The Translator