Success and failure are equally disastrous.

Switch clicking off in my head, turning the hot light off and the cool night on and — [He looks up, smiling sadly.] — all of a sudden there's—peace!

Snatching the eternal out of the desperately fleeting is the great magic trick of human existence.

Is a lifetime long enough to hold the regret that I have for that fantastically aborted but crazily sweet love affair?

Openings come quickly, sometimes, like blue space in running clouds. A complete overcast, then a blaze of light.

The panic disappeared under those soothing old fingers and the breathing slowed down and stopped hurting the chest as if a fox was caught in it, and then at last Mr. Kroger began to lecture the boy as he used to, Pablo, he murmured, don't ever be so afraid of being lonely that you forget to be careful. Don't forget that you will find it sometimes but other times you won't be lucky, and those are the times when you have got to be patient, since patience is what you must have when you don't have luck.

A high station in life is earned by the gallantry with which appalling experiences are survived with grace.