The young know how truly difficult and dreadful youth can be. Their youth is wasted on everyone else, that's the horror. The young have no authority, no respect.

I do not read the ancient languages, but I am beginning to study Greek.

How shameful. How predictable! How insipid. And how sweet.

I was obsessed with religious questions, the basics: Why are we here? Why is the world so beautiful?

I was in the black silence of a medieval street, and blindly I followed its sharp turns, comforted by the height of its narrow tenements, which seemed at any moment capable of falling together, closing this alleyway under indifferent stars like a seam.

And I realized that I’d tolerated him this long because of self-doubt.

I no longer represent any organized religion. I'm not Catholic. I'm not Christian. I'm saying this because I have to be an outsider for Christ.