Perhaps this is our strange and haunting paradox here in America -- that we are fixed and certain only when we are in movement. At any rate, that is how it seemed to young George Webber, who was never so assured of his purpose as when he was going somewhere on a train. And he never had the sense of home so much as when he felt that he was going there. It was only when he got there that his homelessness began.

I don't know yet what I am capable of doing, but, by God, I have genius -- I know it too well to blush behind it.

The whole conviction of my life now rests upon the belief that loneliness, far from being a rare and curious phenomenon, is the central and inevitable fact of human existence.

I believe that we are lost here in America, but I believe we shall be found. And this belief, which mounts now to the catharsis of knowledge and conviction, is for me--and I think for all of us--not only our own hope, but America's everlasting, living dream.

Is this not the true romantic feeling; not to desire to escape life, but to prevent life from escaping you.

You can't go home again

Make your mistakes, take your chances, look silly, but keep on going. Don’t freeze up.