Perhaps all of life is no more than a long preparation for the leaving of it.

Together they will spend a happy hour seated side by side..., while Ivy's tender hand guides Duffy's as he traces out laboriously, in pencil, over and over until he has them off pat, the magic letters of his name. More than the wedding itself, that little ceremony there under the lamp, all silent save for the soft scratching of graphite on paper, will mark the true beginning of their life together.

[DUBLIN - Not everyone was thrilled by the decision last month to give the Man Booker Prize, Britain's most influential literary award, to] The Sea ... Never Let Me Go.

The past beats inside me like a second heart.

Of the things we fashioned for them that they might be comforted, dawn is the one that works.

The telephone ringing gave me a dreadful start. I have never got used to this machine, the way it crouches so malevolently, ready to start clamouring for attention when you least expect it, like a mad baby.