Depression is a democratic sickness: it afflicts everyone.

Democracy is always, by nature and constitution, the triumph of mediocrity.

Fascism rewarded jackasses in uniform. Democracy gives privileges to those in sports' gear. In Italy, political regimes come to pass. Jackasses remain. Triumphant.

The love of power excludes all others.

You give Italy Jesus Christ and you get the Roman Catholic Church.

Pertini has interpreted as their best the worst about Italians.

Cynics are all moralists, and merciless too.

An Italian university is a contradiction in terms.

Which ever one of you will want to become a journalist, let him remember to choose his own master: the reader.

Servitude, in many cases, is not forced upon by the masters, but a temptation of the servants.

Politicians do nothing but ask of us, during every expiration of a legal statute, "a gesture of trust." But here trust is not enough; what's needed is an act of faith.

Books are a poor substitute for female companionship, but they are easier to find.

When we are under a tree, we are under a temple, a temple of countless goodnesses!

I'm just myself. That's the best way to put it.

A man is judged by his friends, for the wise and the foolish have never agreed.

And I have asked to be Where no storms come, Where the green swell is in the havens dumb, And out of the swing of the sea.

Mathematics speaks to the transcendental, as does this extraordinary friendship. A beautiful book!

If he wants meaning-the meaning of his dreams, his secrets, his life-a man must reinhabit his past, however dark, and live for the future, however uncertain.

But you...are my sweetest gift. The life surprise that soothed all my ills and gave me my greatest joys. I feel so blessed you are mine. —Mama Ya-Ya

I read it plain on his face, an implacable determination to get at the truth. C.B. Greenfield had mounted his mental charger, and he had a second horse waiting for me.

I've had a lot of operations. I'm kind of like Franken-actor.