Touch comes before sight, before speech. It is the first language and the last, and it always tells the truth.

The threat to the planet is us. It's actually not a threat to the planet - it's a threat to us.

Amazing how the heart clutches at anything familiar, whimpering Mine!Mine!

Foreignness is all around. Only in the heart of the heart of the country, namely the heart of the United States, can you avoid such a thing. In the center of an empire, you can think of your experience as universal. Outside the empire or on the fringes of the empire, you cannot.

How furious she must be, now that she's been taken at her word.

So that’s what art is, for the artist,” said Crake. “An empty drainpipe. An amplifier. A stab at getting laid.

I have a fork and a spoon, but never a knife… as if I’m lacking manual skills or teeth. I have both, however. That’s why I’m not allowed a knife.