Nothing is intrinsically valuable; the value of everything is attributed to it, assigned to it from outside the thing itself, by people.

The story of your life is not your life; it's your story.

The Bible is not man's word about God, but God's word about man.

Tis e'er the lot of the innocent in the world, to fly to the wolf for succor from the lion.

It's easier and sociabler to talk technique than it is to make art.

More history is made by secret handshakes than by battles, bills and proclamations.

One of the things I miss about teaching is that students would tell me what I ought to read. One of my students, back in the 1960s, put me onto Borges, and I remember another mentioning Flann O'Brien's At Swim Two-Birds in the same way.