(The short story) is a form that has all the power of the novel - some would say more - but none of the self-importance.

It is not a matter of ends justifying means: but of the creation of new means and new ends.

Politics' the polite word for antediluvian prejudices, the rags put on by enmity and tribal resentment.

There is nothing worse than the ambitions of a talentless person.

The most important thing I would learn in school was that almost everything I would learn in school would be utterly useless. When I was fifteen I knew the principal industries of the Ruhr Valley, the underlying causes of World War One and what Peig Sayers had for her dinner every day...What I wanted to know when I was fifteen was the best way to chat up girls. That is what I still want to know.

Beliefs: Those things we hold to be true despite evidence to the contrary.

If you do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always got. If what you are doing is not working, do something else.