Humorists are not humorous twenty-four hours a day. In fact, when you get to know them well, they are often not humorous at all. They tend to be hypersensitive, taut, neurotic creatures driven by God know what obscure compulsion to earn their living the hard way.

The people who say you are not facing reality actually mean that you are not facing their idea of reality

The position of children as a group, in a commercial society, is not wholly advantageous. A commercial society urges its citizens to be responsible for things, but not for people. It is the unquestioned assumption of a mercantile culture that things need and deserve attention, but that people can take care of themselves.

when I spoke of having a drink, it was a euphemism for having a whole flock of them.

The integration of the Negro into American society is one of the most exciting challenges to self-development and self-mastery that any nation of people ever faced.

Father's snoring grows to sound increasingly like a vacuum cleaner in heat.

From a purely tourist standpoint, Oxford is overpowering, being so replete with architecture and history and anecdote that the visitor's mind feels dribbling and helpless, as with an over-large mouthful of nougat.