Obvious enough that generalities work to protect the mind from the great outdoors; is it possible that this was in fact their first purpose?

I like all my children, even the squat and ugly ones.

Occasionally a student writer comes up with something really beautiful and moving, and you won't know for years if it was an accident or the first burst of something wonderful.

Why are stamps adorned with kings and presidents? That we may lick their hinder parts and thump their heads.

I would talk in iambic pentameter if it were easier.

When you write it doesn't occur to you that somebody could think different from what you do.

That so much of our experience, or the stereotype which passes for it should be dealt with by means of the short story is perhaps a symptom not unnoticeable elsewhere in the public domain of an unlovely cynicism about human character.