Paul Theroux

 Maine is a joy in the summer. But the soul of Maine is more apparent in the winter.

Winter is a season of recovery and preparation.

Maine out of season is unmistakably a great destination: hospitable, good-humored, plenty of elbow room, short days, dark nights of crackling ice crystals. 

Many small towns I know in Maine are as tight-knit and interdependent as those I associate with rural communities in India or China; with deep roots and old loyalties, skeptical of authority, they are proud and inflexibly territorial. 

Paul Theroux