The greatest difficulty of Travel is that one is forced to take oneself along.

Our sadness won’t be of the searing kind but more like a blend of joy and melancholy: joy at the perfection we see before us, melancholy at an awareness of how seldom we are sufficiently blessed to encounter anything of its kind. The flawless object throws into perspective the mediocrity that surrounds it. We are reminded of the way we would wish things always to be and of how incomplete our lives remain.

Literature deeply stands opposed to the dominant value system-the one that rewards money and power. Writers are on the other side-they make us sympathetic to ideas and feelings that are of deep importance but can’t afford airtime in a commercialized, status-consciou s, and cynical world.

Those who divorce aren't necessarily the most unhappy, just those neatly able to believe their misery is caused by one other person.

Politics is so difficult, it's generally only people who aren't quite up to the task who feel convinced they are.

We study biology, physics, movements of glaciers... Where are the classes on envy, feeling wronged, despair, bitterness.

To be shown love is to feel ourselves the object of concern: our presence is noted, our name is registered, our views are listened to, our failings are treated with indulgence and our needs are ministered to. And under such care, we flourish.