“ Let me put it this way. Canada is not so much a country as a holding tank filled with the disgruntled progeny of defeated peoples. Mordecai Richler
“ Shame on you. Don't tell me you've been married for an hour and you've already got eyes for another woman. Mordecai Richler
“ I'm rambling again. Wandering off the point. But this is the true story of my wasted life... Mordecai Richler
“ Cripples are not the stuff of romance. Only Lord Byron, dragging his club foot, springs to mind as an exception to the rule, but such a failing in a man is regarded as interesting, even provocative, r… Mordecai Richler
“ Actually when it comes to knocking the Canadian cultural scene nobody outdoes Canadians myself included. We are veritable masters of self-deprecation. Mordecai Richler
“ I work every day-or at least I force myself into my office or room. I may get nothing done but you don't earn bonuses without putting in time. Nothing may come for three months but you don't earn th… Mordecai Richler
“ The process hasn't changed, but the writer has developed. I still get up every morning and go to work. Mordecai Richler
“ Listen your Lordship I'm a respecter of institutions. Even in Paris I remained a Canadian. I puffed hashish but I didn't inhale. Mordecai Richler
“ Fundamentally all writing is about the same thing: it's about dying about the brief flicker of time we have here and the frustrations that it creates. Mordecai Richler
“ I work every day - or at least I force myself into office or room. I may get nothing done but you don't earn bonuses without putting in time. Nothing may come for three months but you don't earn the… Mordecai Richler
“ There are ten commandments right? Well it's like an exam. You get eight out of ten you're just about top of the class. Mordecai Richler
“ I work every day-or at least I force myself into my office or room. I may get nothing done but you don't earn bonuses without putting in time. Nothing may come for three months but you don't get the f… Mordecai Richler
“ One final thought. In the years leading up to my trial, whenever I was caught in bumper-to-bumper traffic on the highway leading to my cottage, creeping along behind a battered, rust eaten pick-up tru… Mordecai Richler
“ Obviously the raven with the unquenchable itch was at it again, playing tricks on the world and its creatures. Once by air, he thought, and now by water. Mordecai Richler
“ ...if I were an angel of the Lord, I would mark the doors of each of my children's homes with an X, so that plague and misfortune would pass over them. Alas, I lack the qualifications. So when there w… Mordecai Richler
“ Ernst was still in the Eastern Zone, about ninety kilometres from Berlin, when the truck emerged so inexplicably out of nowhere that it seemed to have been created by the rain itself. Mordecai Richler
“ We could never agree about Boogie and I didn't share Miriam's reverence for professors. In fact, just in case I haven't mentioned it before, the pride of my office wall is my framed high-school gradua… Mordecai Richler
“ All the same, it strikes me as unfair that I still have to defend myself against her moral judgements. My continuing need for her approbation is pathetic. Twice now I have stopped myself on the street… Mordecai Richler
“ But I hate being a grandfather. It's indecent. In my mind's eye, I'm still twenty-five. Thirty-three max. Certainly not sixty-seven, reeking of decay and dashed hopes. My breath sour. My limbs in dire… Mordecai Richler
