I like to have Chinese furniture in my home as a constant and painful reminder of how much has been destroyed in China. The contrast between the beauty of the past and the ugliness of the modern is nowhere sharper than in China.

It is old age rather than death that is to be contrasted with life. Old age is life's parody whereas death transforms life into a destiny: in a way it preserves it by giving it the absolute dimension. Death does away with time.