When he’s fifteen, he and his mother move to a new town and he starts at a new school.
-- Narrator (chapter 1)

Importance: This line establishes the novel’s starting point and the instability that shapes István’s adolescence. The move tears him out of familiar routines at a vulnerable age and sets up his outsider status in the new school. It signals that his life will be defined by dislocation and by entering social worlds where the rules are already in place.

He only has his own experience.
-- Narrator (chapter 1)

Importance: This brief sentence captures the narrowness of István’s understanding of sex, adulthood, and other people. It emphasizes that he lacks models or language for what he is feeling and seeing, which makes him vulnerable to misreading situations. The line also hints at the book’s commitment to a close, limited point of view that never pretends to know more than Istv...