I've come to think of Europe as a hardcover book, America as the paperback version.

He wanted paper and something to write with, some way to sustain a thought, to place it in the world.

There is no lie in war or preparation of war that can't be defended.

Naturally a direct comparison of terrorist and novelist is complete nonsense. But there was once a time when the novelist also had some influence on how his contemporaries thought, the way they saw the world, the way they lived.

Fame and secrecy are the high and low ends of the same fascination.

The future is always a wholeness, a sameness. We're all tall and happy there,' she said. 'This is why the future fails. It always fails. It can never be the cruel happy place we want to make it.

It was important for him to believe that he'd spent his life among people who kept missing the point.