Never mind the cream; it will always rise to the top. It's the skim milk that needs good teachers.

... good teachers, like Tolstoy's happy families, are alike everywhere.

But if there is such a thing as social commitment in literature, I think it must manifest itself in a reader's awareness of the human condition, in the writer's touching some common nerve ending. I think this kind of social commitment, like a lady's slip, should be there but it must not show.

Learning is a process of mutual discovery for teacher and pupil. Keep an open mind to their unexpected responses.

Time collapses and expands like an erratic accordion.

When giving comes directly from the heart, it can never disappoint or embarrass.

To the outside world, of course, this job is a cinch: 9 to 3, five days a week, two months' summer vacation with pay, all legal holidays, prestige and respect. My mother, for example, has the pleasant notion that my day consists of nodding graciously to the rustle of starched curtsies and a chorus of respectful voices bidding me good morning.