Boileau said that Kings, Gods and Heroes only were fit subjects for literature. The writer can only write about what he admires. Present-day kings aren't very inspiring, the gods are on a vacation and about the only heroes left are the scientists and the poor.

Guys like us got nothing to look ahead to

Misfortune is a fact of nature acceptable to women, especially when it falls on other women.

Texas is not a state - it's a state of mind.

A study of animal communities has this advantage: they are merely what they are, for anyone to see who will and can look clearly; they cannot complicate the picture by worded idealisms, by saying one thing and being another; here the struggle is unmasked and the beauty is unmasked.

Positano bites deep. It is a dream place that isn’t quite real when you are there and becomes beckoningly real after you have gone.

To the heavens on the wings of a pig.