Crasses et Voluptés

Do you know the joys of being alone, walking alone, lying in the sun alone?…Have you ever walked a long way by yourself ? The ability to enjoy it presupposes a great deal of past misery as well as past joys. As a boy I was alone a lot, but it was more from force of circumstance, rarely from choice. Now, however, I rush toward being alone as rivers rush toward the sea.

Elias Canetti, Kafka’s Other Trial: The Letters to Felice