We live in a time of twin credulities: the hunger for the miraculous combined with a servile awe of science. The mating of the two gives us superstition plus scientism -- a Mongoloid metaphysic.

My notion of a great novel is something like a five-hundred-page shaggy-dog story, with only the punch line omitted.

Opera: I like it, except for all those howling sopranos and caterwauling tenors. (Why can't tenors sing like men?)

In the land of bleating sheep and braying jackasses, one brave and honest man is bound to create a scandal.

Life is hard? True - but let's love it anyhow, though it breaks every bone in our bodies.

To the question: Wilderness, who needs it? Doc would say: Because we like the taste of freedom, comrades. Because we like the smell of danger. But, thought Hayduke, what about the smell of fear, Dad?

We know this apodictic rock beneath our feet. That dogmatic sun above our heads. The world of dreams, the agony of love and the foresight of death. That is all we know. And all we need to know? Challenge that statement.