The human species really could have faced global thermonuclear war. During seventy years of Cold War we grew used to it.

I don't have a strong interest in history.

How much intelligence does it take to sneak up on a leaf?

Spray a book with insect spray, drop it in a bag, add some mothballs and seal it. Put it in another bag and seal it. Another. The packages piled up on the floor, each a book sealed in four plastic envelopes.

It is a cardinal sin to bore the reader.

It's very difficult for a black man to get out of South-Central Los Angeles, and get out civilized....The only men I know who have escaped, all began reading Robert Heinlein at age ten.

I've spent a lot of my life among people brighter than myself.