Education had been easy. Learning things had been harder.

In my experience, what every true artist wants, really wants, is to be paid.

Things just happen. What the hell.

Fascism may be good at making the trains run on time, but you wouldn't like some of the destinations.

...no-one is finally dead until the ripples they cause in the world die away... The span of someone's life, they say, is only the core of their actual existence.

Cutangle: While I'm still confused and uncertain, it's on a much higher plane, d'you see, and at least I know I'm bewildered about the really fundamental and important facts of the universe. Treatle: I hadn't looked at it like that, but you're absolutely right. He's really pushed back the boundaries of ignorance. They both savoured the strange warm glow of being much more ignorant than ordinary people, who were only ignorant of ordinary things.

...it is well known that a vital ingredient of success is not knowing that what you're attempting can't be done.