Nabokov's Speak, Memory:

...shady recesses would then harbor that special boletic reek which makes a Russian's nostrils dilate—a dark, dank, satisfying blend of damp moss, rich earth, rotting leaves.

Boletic=pertaining to, or obtained from the Boletus (a mushroom); boletic acid

Whenever in my dreams I see the dead, they always appear silent, bothered, strangely depressed, quite unlike their dear bright selves. I am aware of them, without any astonishment, in surroundings they never visited during their earthly existence, in the house of some friend of mine they never knew. They sit apart, frowning at the floor, as if death were a dark taint, a shameful family secret. It is certainly not then—not in dreams—but when one is wide awake, at moments of robust joy and achievement, on the highest terrace of consciousness, that mortality has a chance to peer beyond its own limits, from the mast, from the past and its castle tower. And although nothing much can be seen through the mist, there is somehow the blissful feeling that one is looking in the right direction.

Terry Teachout on liking Art:

As it happens...I’ve changed my mind about art more than once, and in so doing I’ve learned that I not infrequently start by disliking something and end up liking it. Not always—sometimes I decide on close acquaintance that a novel or painting isn’t as good as I’d thought. (I used to like Picasso’s Guernica a lot more than I do now.) More often, though, I realize that it was necessary for me to grow into a fuller understanding of a work of art to which my powers of comprehension were not at first equal. The music critic Hans Keller said something shrewd about this phenomenon: “As soon as I detest something I ask myself why I like it.”