India, Nov. 22 -- Some days ago, I bought a T-shirt with a line of text on it that stopped me short: "Every man's life ends the same way. It is only the details of how he lived and how he died that distinguish one man from another."

That was Ernest Hemingway in For Whom the Bell Tolls (1940).

I have always loved quotes like this one, that linger in the mind. So the T-shirt quickly became a favourite. As an aside, I often slip into the quiet hobby of people-watching. A couple talking softly. A group of teenagers arguing with the easy, lazy confidence one acquires, for a brief while, at this age. A young woman typing furiously (or angrily?) into her phone.

In moments like this, the line on the T-shirt has begun to creep to the front of t...