All the big words -virtue, justice, truth, ...- are dwarfed by the greatness of kindness

I am a lover of truth, a worshipper of freedom, a celebrant at the altar of language and purity and tolerance.

I do think it's important not to be absolutely sure, so sure that you can't reinvent yourself in some way, or at least rediscover the truth of why you think what you think, and not just take it as an assumption.

To be human and to be adult means constantly to be in the grip of opposing emotions, to have daily to reconcile apparently conflicting tensions. I want this, but need that. I cherish this, but I adore its opposite too.

You don't get depressed because bad things happen to you. That's getting pissed off and annoyed. That's reasonable. Someone hits you in the face you go ow, you know that's... but depression is something that happens like weather to you inside you.

I went to Cambridge and thought I would stay there. I thought I would quietly grow tweed in a corner somewhere and become a Don or something.

Glory never arrives through the front door. She sneaks in uninvited round the back or through an upstairs window while you are sleeping.