An essential part of power is the freedom not to think too deeply

You can't state difference and also state equality. We have to state sameness to understand equality.

As far as I'm concerned, if you want to find out about the last day of WWII or the roots of the Indian Mutiny, get thee to a books catalogue.

The past is always tense, the future perfect.

Protect the time and space in which you write. Keep everybody away from it, even the people who are most important to you.

Every moment happens twice: inside and outside, and they are two different histories.

Don’t romanticise your ‘vocation’. You can either write good sentences or you can’t. There is no ‘writer’s lifestyle’. All that matters is what you leave on the page.

Time is how you spend your love.

I am the sole author of the dictionary that defines me.

Don't confuse honours with achievement.

Pulchritude--beauty where you would least suspect it, hidden in a word that looked like it should signify a belch or a skin infection.

Perspective and perseverance are carved by time and constructed by wisdom.

(...) like he left a piece of himself with youand you are terrifiedhe is coming back for it.Or he left a piece of himself with you and you are terrified he is not coming back for it.

A Fiat Panda, it's the best car in the world.

It is, by common consent, a good thing for people to get back to nature.

Blacks have traditionally had to operate in a situation where whites have set themselves up as the custodians of the black experience.

Men who are ruled by reason desire nothing for themselves which they would not wish for all mankind.

What are friends? Friends are people you think are your friends but they really your enemies, with secret identities.

We lost the crickets.

A poor idea well written is more likely to be accepted than a good idea poorly written

Like thousands of other boys, I had a little chemical laboratory in our cellar and think that some of our friends thought me a bit crazy.