nothing she did or said was quite what she meant but still her life could be called a monument shaped in a slant of available light and set to the movement of possible music

This is why I read novels: so I can escape my own unrelenting monologue.

Write the book you want to read, the one you cannot find.

Open a book this minute and start reading. Don’t move until you’ve reached page fifty. Until you’ve buried your thoughts in print. Cover yourself with words. Wash yourself away. Dissolve.

Go for long walks, indulge in hot baths, Question your assumptions, be kind to yourself, live for the moment, loosen up, scream, curse the world, count your blessings, Just let go, Just be.

There are chapters in every life which are seldom read and certainly not aloud.

Bookish people, who are often maladroit people, persist in thinking they can master any subtlety so long as it's been shaped into acceptable expository prose.

Anyone's childhood can be an act of disablement if rehearsed and replayed and squinted at in a certain light. . .

Words are our life. We are human because we use language. So I think we are less human when we use less language.

The scolding voice is her own, so abrasive and quick, yet so powerless to move her.

The recounting of a life is a cheat...even our own stories are obscenely distorted.

Healthy curiosity is a great key in innovation.

Happy are you who love for you are loved by God! Alleluia! Amen!

the truth is that it's far easier to make a bomb than to educate four hundred million people.

I definitely like to go out and dance. I'm a big vibe person when it comes to music so a song really has to make me feel a certain way in order for me to fall in love with it.

He is next to the gods whom reason, and not passion, impels; and who, after weighing the facts, can measure the punishment with discretion.

If you ask any great player or great quarterback, there's a certain inner confidence that you're as good as anybody. But you can't say who is the absolute best. To be considered is special in itself.

Good luck with your asparagus.

We have places in America that really have been just forgotten.

The facts will eventually test all our theories, and they form, after all, the only impartial jury to which we can appeal.

The first impression of a work of art is its otherness from reality.