«I suspect that if I get any sort of a decent dying time; I shall want music rather than books. Will there be space - head-space - for the wonderful trudgery of fiction, the work involved: plot, characters, situation...? No, I think I'm going to need music, fittingly intravenous: straight to the bloodstream, straight to the heart. "The best means we have of digesting time" will perhaps help us digest the beginnings of death. Music is also associated for me with optimism. I had an instant sense of fellow-feeling when I read that one of the pleasures of Isaiah Berlin's old age was booking concert tickets for months ahead (I often used to spot him, up in the same box at the Festival Hall). Getting the tickets somehow guarantees that you will hear the music, prolongs your life at least until the last echo of final chords you have paid to hear dies away».
JULIAN BARNES