The nation that complacently and fearfully allows its artists and writers to become suspected rather than respected is no longer regarded as a nation possessed with humor or depth.

American girls often marry someone they can't stand to spite someone they can.

A drawing is always dragged down to the level of its caption.

He knows all about art, but he doesn't know what he likes.

We are a nation that has always gone in for the loud laugh, the wow, the yak, the belly laugh, and the dozen other labels for the roll- em-in-the-aisles gagerissimo. This is the kind of laugh that delights actors, directors, and producers, but dismays writers of comedy because it is the laugh that often dies in the lobby. The appreciative smile, the chuckle, the soundless mirth, so important to the success of comedy, cannot be understood unless one sits among the audience and feels the warmth created by the quality of laughter that the audience takes home with it.

Sixty minutes of thinking of any kind is bound to lead to confusion and unhappiness.

Man is troubled by what might be called the Dog Wish, a strange and involved compulsion to be as happy and carefree as a dog