Culture is the study of perfection, and the constant effort to achieve it.

Narcissism and the Confederate dead cannot be connected logically, or even historically; even were the connection an historical fact, they would not stand connected as art, for no one experiences raw history.

Among friends one has the privilege of saying nothing; the civility consists in the assumption that one's silence will be civilly understood. I can imagine a small gathering of friends who say nothing all evening: they recoil from saying anything that the others don't want to hear; and their silence would be the subtlest courtesy.

Death's long anabasis.

Genetic theories, I gather, have been cherished academically with detachment.

Yevgeny Yevtushenko is a ham actor, not a poet.

Experience means conflict, our natures being what they are, and conflict means drama.