The myth that everyone once read great literature is just a myth.

My brother and I were both good at science, and we were both good at English literature. Either one of us could have gone either way.

Gardening is not a rational act. What matters is the immersion of the hands in the earth, that ancient ceremony of which the Pope kissingthe tarmac is merely a pallid vestigial remnant.

Men are not to be told anything they might find too painful; the secret depths of human nature, the sordid physicalities, might overwhelm or damage them. For instance, men often faint at the sight of their own blood, to which they are not accustomed. For this reason you should never stand behind one in the line at the Red Cross donor clinic.

In Shakespeare Saved My Life, [author Laura Bates] said she got better papers from [prisoners] than she got from people in her regular classes. Because she was teaching, of course, Macbeth, and a number of them had murdered people. The guy who wrote the best paper said, "You do have this, 'Is this a dagger which I see before me?' before you do it, but in my case it was a gun."

Powerlessness and silence go together.

I was delighted with the film [Payback: Debt and the Shadow Side of Wealth]; it almost made me want to be a film-maker!