...but I preferred reading the American landscape as we went along. Every bump, rise, and stretch in it mystified my longing.

And as far as I can see the world is too old for us to talk about it with our new words.

The cause of the world's woe is birth, the cure of the world's woe is a bent stick.

Never dreaming, was I, poor Jack Duluoz, that the soul is dead. That from Heaven grace descends . . . No Doctor Pisspot Poorpail to tell me; no example inside my first and only skin. That love is the heritage, and cousin to death. That the only love can only be the first love, the only death the last, the only life within, and the only word . . . choked forever.

Better to sleep in an uncomfortable bed free, than sleep in a comfortable bed unfree.

The whole mad swirl of everything that was to come began then.

I'd rather hop freights around the country and cook my food out of tin cans over wood fires, than be rich and have a home or work.