The north-south line of 'the mountains,' meaning the Cascade Range, forty miles east of Seattle, is a rigid political frontier.

The Falklands held a mirror up to our own islands, and it reflected, in brilliantly sharp focus, all our injured belittlement, our sense of being beleaguered, neglected and misunderstood.

Travel. It was an intransitive verb. It didn't involve any destinations. It was going to the going's sake, to be anywhere but where you were, with motion itself as the only object.

Interstate highways dull the reality of place and distance almost as effectively as jetliners do: I loathe their scary monotony.

The mythical America?that marvellous, heroic, sentimental landwas an object of faith. It challenged you to make the believer's leap over the rude facts at your feet.

In an underdeveloped country don't drink the water. In a developed country don't breathe the air.

Lincoln, steeped in the Bible and Shakespeare, set an impossibly high bar for presidential prose.

Critics? Don't talk to me of critics! You think some jackanapes journalist, his soul eaten away by the maggots of jealousy and failure, has anything worthwhile to say of art? I don't.

Seattle was built out on pilings over the sea, and at high tide the whole city seemed to come afloat like a ship lifting free from a mud berth and swaying in its chains.

Good travel books are novels at heart.

In novels and autobiographies, the first positive move that the immigrant makes towards assimilation is to buy himself a suit of city clothes.

Music is the primordial language of life. That is why we love it so much. Actually every animal can hear and understand music better than we do.

Keep encouraging one another with affectionate love.

What matter most is not the sin. The moment of repentance: go and sin no more.

Music is another planet.

Endurance is nobler than strength, and patience than beauty.

The great masses of the people will more easily fall victims to a big lie than to a small one.

It is not that I want merely to be called a Christian, but actually to be one. Yes, if I prove to be one, then I can have the name.

Disaster is around the corner. It is, it's lurking, it's incredibly negative. Am I thinking about the bad times ahead? Jesus, no. I've got to remain positive, I'm going to fight this negativity!

There are subjects in which I wish to become knowledgeable, and subjects in which I wish to remain wise.