A dead afternoon in a dark bar was not the worst of fates.

Do people still shoot at presidents? I thought there were more stimulating targets.' (20)

The world is shrinking into a kind of technological funnel. I think people are drawn into their technological devices, and this becomes a kind of subjective universe, into which much of the rest of the world simply does not enter.

When you try to unravel something you've written, you belittle it in a way. It was created as a mystery.

Fame requires every kind of excess. I mean true fame, a devouring neon, not the sombre renown of waning statesmen or chinless kings.

I am ashamed every day, and more ashamed the next. But I will spend the rest of my life in this living space writing these notes, this journal, recording my acts and reflections, finding some honor, some worth at the bottom of things. I want ten thousand pages that will stop the world.

I understand there are some men who are only half here. Let's not say men. Let's say people. People who are more or less obscure at times.