The 1960s was probably the first time in history that young people were recognized as a big group of consumers and as a commercial proposition for Madison Avenue. Advertising played a major role in creating the ethos of that era - the idea that, "Here it is, and you can have it now." I know that many kids thought that the ethos of the 1960s was due to their own peculiar virtues, but, in fact, it had a lot to do with the realities of the marketplace and commerce.

...We try to have things both ways. We’ve always refused to live by the book and the rule; but then why start worrying because the world doesn’t treat us by rule?

there are two kinds of humanity, those who dream and those who don't, and both tend to despise, or to tolerate, the other.

Men are restless, adventurous. Women are conservative - despite what current ideology says.

A public library is the most democratic thing in the world. What can be found there has undone dictators and tyrants: demagogues can persecute writers and tell them what to write as much as they like, but they cannot vanish what has been written in the past, though they try often enough...People who love literature have at least part of their minds immune from indoctrination. If you read, you can learn to think for yourself.

It is terrible to destroy a person's picture of himself in the interests of truth or some other abstraction.

Living in a small town anywhere means preserving one's self behind a mask.