“The tune was wailing and mournful, almost flagrantly so, and the total effect was of a heartbroken piccolo being parted forever from its bagpipe lover.”

“You have to be very deep to be dead, he thought, and I'm not. He began to have some concept of forever, and his mind shivered as his body had when he had wakened in the cold nights and thrust his h...”

“I'll tell you something. Once I was very fond of a poem by Emily Dickinson or somebody. I only remember one line of it, but it goes, 'The soul selects her own society.' I used to tell it to everybo...”

“You think this is living? This is eating, nothing else.”

“So I had something to do, something I'd done, someplace to go, and something to look forward to. That's a reasonable way to live. I enjoyed myself living. I had a good time. How much else can you a...”

“There are no happy endings, he knew, because nothing ends; and if there were any being dispensed, a great many worthier people would be in line for them long before Michael and Laura and himself. B...”

“Knowledge, like air, is vital to life. Like air, no one should be denied it.”

“Science is organized knowledge. Wisdom is organized life.”

“I definitely learned a lesson this time. I know that I can be broken. I am not as tough as I thought. I see it now. At this point, it's the only thing good that came out of all of this. I know myse...”

“I was a woman and did not yet think of myself as a writer. I was a mapmaker.”

“I am fevered with the sunset I am fretful with the bay For the wander-thirst is on me And my soul is in Cathay.”

“As the Spanish proverb says "He who would bring home the wealth of the Indies must carry the wealth of the Indies with him." So it is in traveling: a man must carry knowledge with him if he would...”

“The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.”

“The secret of life, though, is to fall seven times and to get up eight times.”

“It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.”