“Music could ache and hurt, that beautiful music was a place a suffering man could hide.”

“Carolina beach music," Dupree said, coming up on the porch. "The holiest sound on earth.”

“Writing poetry and reading books causes brain damage.”

“It's politics . . . It makes everybody stupid. When you grow up, you'll know what I mean.”

“The pursuit of greatness means that laziness has no place in your life.”

“Wasn't Atlanta the murder capital of the U.S. last year?" "Yes, but the airport's perfectly safe.”

“Sibyl, what do you want?I want to live, the Sibyl said, and her voice rang rich and full. I want to keep on living forever and watching heroes and fools and knights go up and down, into the world a...”

“When God is driven to the periphery of the public square, the human spiritual capacity longs for exercise, and it often finds it in the suspension of disbelief and activity of the imagination that ...”

“When is a monster not a monster? Oh, when you love it.”