“It's not much. You begin by thinking there is something extraordinary about it. But you'll find out, when you've been out in the world a while longer, unhappiness is the commonest thing there is.”

“A man can gasp out his life beside you-and you feel none of it. Pity, Sympathy, sure-but you don't feel the pain. Your belly is whole and that's what counts. A half-yard away someone's world is snu...”

“A crude age. Peace is stabilized with cannon and bombers, humanity with concentration camps and pogroms. We're living in a time when all standards are turned upside-down, Kern. Today the aggressor ...”

“Today the aggressor is the shepherd of peace, and the beaten and hunted are the troublemakers of the world. What's more, there are whole races who believe it!”

“God turns you from one feeling to another and teaches by means of opposites so that you will have two wings to fly, not one”

“But why, why, why can't people just say what they mean?”

“Don't be afraid to be confused. Try to remain permanently confused. Anything is possible. Stay open, forever, so open it hurts, and then open up some more, until the day you die, world without end,...”