If you actually want to change your world, there is a better way of doing it than blowing yourself up.

Literature is the one place in any society where, within the secrecy of our own heads, we can hear voices talking about everything in every possible way.

A book is a product of a pact with the Devil that inverts the Faustian contract, he'd told Allie. Dr Faustus sacrificed eternity in return for two dozen years of power; the writer agrees to the ruination of his life, and gains (but only if he's lucky) maybe not eternity, but posterity, at least. Either way (this was Jumpy's point) it's the Devil who wins.

Children are the vessels into which adults pour their poison.

Freedom is not a tea party, India. Freedom is a war.

Like everybody else, I've had relationships in which I was passionately in love but was completely miserable all the time and didn't trust the person I was in love with one inch.

If you're offended, it's your problem.