For what are the words with which to summarize a lifetime, so much crowded confused happiness terminated by such stark slow-motion pain?

For some reason, voters can be brainwashed, and they vote sometimes against their own best interests, let alone voting against the interests of people who need them, like people who are disenfranchised and people who are poor and so forth.

The innocence of such children doesn't answer our deepest questions about this vale of tears to which we are condemned, but it helps to dispel them. That is the secret to family life.

Language is the instrument in all cases and can language be trusted?If it were not for language, could we lie?

An actress wants to be seen. An actress wants to be loved. By multitudes of people, not just one lone man.

I see the world in ways that might be considered somewhat harsh and Darwinistic. At the same time mediated, as in Darwin, by a real idealism and an excitement about the possibilities of the intellect and imagination to deal with this somewhat brutal world.

Anyone who teaches knows that you don't really experience a text until you've taught it, in loving detail, with an intelligent and responsive class.