Male staff members at the Grand waded through the myths that surrounded her, enjoying the feeling of being stuck.

Boundaries of Nations: With time, I learned to love and master my scenes, putting all the devotion and care into them that our town, our Shakespeare, deserved.

Boundaries of Taste: And as I parted my lips and then, later, my legs, watching the last clouds of smoke slip upward, I kept hearing my mother’s voice say, “Jesus is a fire.”

He did not want her to think what might possibly be true: that he was going mad.

First there was a little crackle as the pin scratched the record and then the voices would begin to sing or talk and would float into the surrounding inky darkness.

The apocalypse was quiet. It had a way about it, a certain charm. It could be called graceful. It was taking a long time.

They are just everywhere, walking, rushing, running, toyi-toying, fists and machetes and knives and sticks and all sorts of weapons and the flags of the country in the air, Budapest quivering with the sound of their blazing voices: Kill the Boer, the farmer, the khiwa.

Soon it was all they could do to keep these children from singeing the draperies or shattering the glass windowpanes with a single touch.

Notes on names Boy gets called at school: fudge packer, pansy, fairy, pillow biter, cock gobbler.

What delighted me was watching how the sun changed my appearance. I spent nightly hours in the mirror, describing the new shades and hues of my face or arms to my martin, who was colorblind.