The trouble is that we have a bad habit, encouraged by pedants and sophisticates, of considering happiness as something rather stupid. Only pain is intellectual, only evil interesting. This is the treason of the artist: a refusal to admit the banality of evil and the terrible boredom of pain.

We need writers who know the difference between the production of a commodity and the practice of an art.

Children know perfectly well that unicorns aren’t real, but they also know that books about unicorns, if they are good books, are true books.

There are two kinds of knowledge, local and universal.

I know that nobody who hasn't been in battle or under attack can know what war is. But even in terms of being safe at home, it's also true that many Americans who think they know what being at war is, don't. Including, of course, George W. Bush and his people. They don't have a clue.

What the brain does by itself is infinitely more fascinating and complex than any response it can make to chemical stimulation.

One voice speaking truth is a greater force than fleets and armies.