The future could go this way, that way. The future's futures have never looked so rocky. Don't put money on it. Take my advice and stick to the present. It's the real stuff, the only stuff, it's all there is, the present, the panting present.

Tennis: the most perfect combination of athleticism, artistry, power, style, and wit. A beautiful game, but one so remorselessly travestied by the passage of time.

At its grandest, political correctness is an attempt to accelerate evolution.

Present-day Spain translates as many books into Spanish, annually, as the Arab world has translated into Arabic in the past 1,100 years.

One thing you can't help noticing in South America and in Latin culture, generally, is how nice people are. Although when I went back to Spain - my mother lived in Spain and both my brothers lived there - after the Uruguay trip, I thought, "Oh great, Hispanic people." But they weren't nearly as nice as the Uruguayans. They're quite proud and pissed off, the Spaniards.

Time, the human dimension, which makes us everything we are.

Each life is a game of chess that went to hell on the seventh move(...)