What we think we are surely going to do, we don't do; and what we never intended to do, we may one day notice that we have done, and done, and done.

If we had to say what writing is, we would have to define it essentially as an act of courage.

What was lost in the European cataclysm was not only the Jewish past--the whole life of a civilization--but also a major share ofthe Jewish future.... [ellipsis in source] It was not only the intellect of a people in its prime that was excised, but the treasure of a people in its potential.

One reason writers write is out of revenge.

The engineering is secondary to the vision.

We often take for granted the very things that most deserve our gratitude.

In books, as in life, there are no second chances. On second thought: its the next work, still to be written, that offers the second chance.