going back to reread Tale of Time City now, thank you, the quotation having reminded me how good it is in so many ways. Especially, as a translator who works with "symbols that [do] not exactly stand for letters, nor for whole words either," reading your take on that particular passage!
Also the way Jonathan changes over the whole book, and the hint of Jenny's complicated grief for her brother at the end, and Elio's "I forgot that two percent is just as wet as any other rain"--a passage I have quoted often in various contexts--and the clothes with little hearts floating on them.
And God knows we are living in an Unstable Era if there ever was one...