For me, university was just awful because it was closing one door after the other of all these candy shops of professional possibilities.

I keep a quotes journal - of every sentence that I've wanted to remember from my reading of the past 30 years.

Music forecasts the past, recalls the future. Now and then the difference falls away, and in one simple gift of circling sound, the ear solves the scrambled cryptogram. One abiding rhythm, present and always, and you're free. But a few measures more, and the cloak of time closes back around you.

The thing that makes reading and writing suspect in the eyes of the market economy is that it's not corrupted.

I would say the flip side to my fascination with systems is a fascination with components. So many of my books are dialogues between little and big.

Librarian is a service occupation. Gas station attendant of the mind.

All we can ever do is lay a word in the hands of those who have put one in ours.