But there are things you can't consult anybody about.

As for types like my own, obscurely motivated by the conviction that our existence was worthless if we didn't make a turning point of it, we were assigned to the humanities, to poetry, philosophy, painting - the nursery games of humankind, which had to be left behind when the age of science began. The humanities would be called upon to choose a wallpaper for the crypt, as the end drew near.

... an era of turmoil and ideological confusion, the principal phenomenon of the present age.

Here we write well when we expose frauds and hypocrites. We are great at counting warts and blemishes and weighting feet of clay. In expressing love, we belong among the underdeveloped countries.

I've never turned over a fig leaf yet that didn't have a price tag on the other side.

Death deserves dignity.

How should I know why! I didn't invent human beings, Iggy.