Journeys are the midwives of thought. Few places are more conducive to internal conversations than moving planes, ships or trains.

You normally have to be bashed about a bit by life to see the point of daffodils, sunsets and uneventful nice days.

One of the best protections against disappointment is to have a lot going on.

The more dignity is widely and freely available in a society, the less people want to be famous.

If it is true that love is the pursuit in another of qualities we lack in ourselves, then in our love of someone from another culture, one ambition may be to weld ourselves more closely to values missing from our own culture.

Distress at losing an object can be as much a frustration at the intellectual mystery of the disappearance as about the loss itself.

Literature deserves its prestige for one reason above all others - because it's a tool to help us live and die with a little bit more wisdom, goodness, and sanity.