Any virtue systematically applied becomes a vice. Morality is attention, not system.

Only half of writing is saying what you mean. The other half is preventing people from reading what they expected you to mean.

Nothing important comes with instructions.

What is more yours than what always holds you back?

The best way to know your faults is to notice which ones you accuse others of.

Writing is like washing windows in the sun. With every attempt to perfect clarity, you make a new smear.

When I am trying to write I turn on music so I can hear what is keeping me from hearing.

Sophistication is upscale conformity.

The happy and the suffering probably understand life equally well, but the sufferers may see a little more clearly how little it is that they understand.

It is the empty seats that listen most raptly.

All work is the avoidance of harder work.

Don't ever live vicariously. This is your life. Live.

I don’t regret anything I was before because I still am.I only regret not having loved you.Put your hands in mineAnd let’s be quiet, surrounded by life.

I write to find what I have to say. I edit to figure out how to say it right.

I think something wonderful is going to happen to me. Maybe tomorrow. The phone can ring and your whole life can change.

I couldn't get any jobs, and when that happens, you get so humble it's disgusting. I didn't feel like a man anymore -- I felt really creepy. I was bumping into walls and saying, Excuse me.

Life is a sexually transmitted terminal disease.

Grass is growing on the Front Bench.

Who's the other kid in the photo?' he asked. 'The sandy-haired guy.' Annabeth's expression tightened. Touchy subject. 'That's Luke,' she said. 'He's dead now.

I never saw no miracle of science that did not go from a blessing to a curse.

The authorizing committees are free to set their agency budgets, and that includes NASA.