No nostalgia runs deeper than that for something one has never known and now cannot obtain.
Joseph EpsteinWhile reading writers of great formulatory power โ Henry James, Santayana, Proust โ I find I can scarcely get through a page without having to stop to record some lapidary sentence. Reading Henry James, for example, I have muttered to myself, "Cโmon, Henry, turn down the brilliance a notch, so I can get some reading done." I may be one of a very small number of people who have developed writerโs cramp while reading.
Joseph EpsteinIf geniuses can sometimes make mistakes, cannot the rest of us on occasion be geniuses?
Joseph EpsteinA writer can get into a vast deal of trouble through misquotation. If you ever want to receive lots of mail, I recommend you get a Shakespeare quote wrong in a magazine or newspaper.
Joseph EpsteinA cat is the only domestic animal I know who toilet trains itself and does a damned impressive job of it.
Joseph EpsteinI am afraid I am one of those people who continues to read in the hope of sometime discovering in a book a singleโand singularโpiece of wisdom so penetrating, so soul stirring, so utterly applicable to my own life as to make all the bad books I have read seem well worth the countless hours spent on them. My guess is that this wisdom, if it ever arrives, will do so in the form of a generalization.
Joseph Epstein