The West begins where the average annual rainfall drops below twenty inches. When you reach the line which marks that drop - for convenience, the one hundredth meridian - you have reached the West.
Bernard DeVotoThe trouble with the sacred Individual is that he has no significance, except as he can acquire it from others, from the social whole.
Bernard DeVotoThe rat stops gnawing in the wood, the dungeon walls withdraw, the weight is lifted your pulse steadies and the sun has found your heart, the day was not bad, the season has not been bad, there is sense and even promise in going on.
Bernard DeVotoWhen evening quickens in the street, comes a pause in the day's occupation that is known as the cocktail hour. It marks the lifeward turn. The heart wakens from coma and its dyspnea ends. Its strengthening pulse is to cross over into campground, to believe that the world has not been altogether lost or, if lost, then not altogether in vain.
Bernard DeVoto