Donna Leon Quotes

She became his Ariadne, leading him through the labyrinth of books, stopping now and then to pass another one to him.

We buy things. We wear them or put them on our walls, or sit on them, but anyone who wants to can take them away from us. Or break them....Long after he's dead, someone else will own those stupid little boxes, and then someone after him, just as someone owned them before he did. But no one ever thinks of that: objects survive us and go on living. It's stupid to believe we own them. And it's sinful for them to be so important.

Oh, so seldom does fate cast our enemy into our hands, to do with as we will

And off in the far distance, the gold on the wings of the angel atop the bell tower of San Marco flashed in the sun, bathing the entire city in its glistening benediction.

Most people — however much they might deny it — had an idea of what they were getting into when they got into it.

Her mask gave no sign of how this affected her.

Perception of personal danger very often set people on the path of virtue.

Though everyone in the bar knew who he was, no one asked him about the death, though one old man did rustle his newspaper suggestively.