The ideal death, I think, is what was the ideal Victorian death, you know, with your grandchildren around you, a bit of sobbing. And you say goodbye to your loved ones, making certain that one of them has been left behind to look after the shop.

The space between the young reader’s eyeballs and the printed page is a holy place and officialdom should trample all over it at their peril.’

Inside every lump of coal there's a diamond waiting to get out.

And sin, young man, is when you treat people like things.

You're allowed to grant people into the darkness, but you must allow them to come out again.

I commend my soul to any god that can find it.

You see the lighted windows and what you want to think is that there may be many interesting stories behind them, but what you know is that really there are just dull, dull souls, mere consumers of food, who think their instincts are emotions and their tiny lives of more account than a whisper of wind.