The profession of shaman has many advantages. It offers high status with a safe livelihood free of work in the dreary, sweaty sense. In most societies it offers legal privileges and immunities not granted to other men. But it is hard to see how a man who has been given a mandate from on High to spread tidings of joy to all mankind can be seriously interested in taking up a collection to pay his salary; it causes one to suspect that the shaman is on the moral level of any other con man. But it is a lovely work if you can stomach it.

I think that science fiction has a distinct therapeutic value because all of it has as its primary postulate that the world does change. I cannot overemphasize the importance of that idea.

Nursing does not diminish the beauty of a woman's breasts; it enhances their charm by making them look lived in and happy.

Luck is a tag given by the mediocre to account for the accomplishments of genius.

Spacemen - men who work in space, pilots and jetmen and astrogators and such - are men who like a few million miles of elbow room.

A poet who reads his verse in public may have other nasty habits.

If you would know a man, observe how he treats a cat.