Daniel supposed he had a secret life. Most people did; it was hardly possible to live without one.

A regime which combines perpetual surveillance with total indulgence is hardly conducive to healthy development.

There comes a time when every scientist, even God, has to write off an experiment.

Childhood is the one prison from which there's no escape, the one sentence from which there's no appeal. We all serve our time.

A politician is required to listen to humbug, talk humbug, condone humbug. The most we can hope for is that we don't actually believe it.

What was so terrible about grief was not grief itself, but that one got over it.

No literary form is more revealing, more spontaneous or more individual than a letter.