Age was respected among his people, but achievement was revered. As the elders said, if a child washed his hands he could eat with kings.

That we are surrounded by deep mysteries is known to all but the incurably ignorant.

Democracy is not something you put away for ten years, and then in the 11th year you wake up and start practicing again. We have to begin to learn to rule ourselves again.

I tell my students, it's not difficult to identify with somebody like yourself, somebody next door who looks like you. What's more difficult is to identify with someone you don't see, who's very far away, who's a different color, who eats a different kind of food. When you begin to do that then literature is really performing its wonders.

Wisdom is like a goatskin bag; every man carries his own.

The only thing we have learnt from experience is that we learn nothing from experience.

People create stories create people; or rather stories create people create stories.