The shaping of taste is essentially the science of merchandising, whether of detergents or cars or books or objects of fine and decorative art.

The bungalow had more to do with how Americans live today than any other building that has gone remotely by the name of architecture in our history.

Improvisation was the blood and bone of jazz, and in the classic, New Orleans jazz it was collective improvisation in which each performer, seemingly going his own melodic way, played in harmony, dissonance, or counterpoint with the improvisations of his colleagues. Quite unlike ragtime, which was written down in many cases by its composers and could be repeated note for note (if not expression for expression) by others, jazz was a performer's not a composer's art.

The world of the arts is by no means always comfortable, but neither is it likely ever to be boring. It is full of surprises, humor, traps for the unwary, and challenges to smugness. It is a world of moods as well as of revelation, of beliefs and fears, of unpleasant truth as well as of delicious fantasy. Perhaps it is arrogant to say that anyone who does not venture into this world is only half-interested in life. I say it, nonetheless.

A truly appreciative child will break, lose, spoil, or fondle to death any really successful gift within a matter of minutes.

In my estimation, the only thing that is more to be guarded against than bad taste is good taste.

Clutter is what happens to things when they become useless but friendly.