We spend a good part of our lives dreaming, especially when we're awake.

[H]e lay awake, dreading the dawn when he would have to say good-bye to the small universe he had built for himself over the years.

After a while it occurred to me that between the covers of each of those books lay a boundless universe waiting to be discovered while beyond those walls, in the outside world, people allowed life to pass by in afternoons of football and radio soaps, content to do little more than gaze at their navels.

The only use for military service is that it reveals the number of morons in the population," he would remark. "And that can be discovered in the first two weeks; there's no need for two years. Army, Marriage, the Church and Banking: the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Yes, go on, laugh.

Silence makes idiots seem wise even for a minute.

A Gentleman's agreement cannot be broken without breaking the person who has entered into it.

Sometimes, in difficult circumstances, one can confuse compassion with love.