But all I could think of was taking some books to read in jail. I held everybody up, choosing which ones to take.

The so-called Beat Generation was a whole bunch of people, of all different nationalities, who came to the conclusion that society sucked.

Jazz music hashaunted America for seventy years.It has tempted us out of our lily-white reserve with its black promise of untrammeled joy.

Some books accrete things to themselves like a magnet. The writer risks sterility by subjecting the mysterious power of imagination to the devices of mere comprehension.

The idiotic industry of an ant building his hill in the path of a glacier, and imagining that he is free.

Nothing like the road to rub all the sand out of your soul.

Certain kinds of clichés are the narcotics of the middle class.

For invented gods invariably disappoint those who worship them.

When times get tough, and you are feeling isolated, remember that you are not alone.

Loving others is the greatest gift we can give ourselves. Altruism that rewards one's self.

You are very kind, " he said. "Very wrong, but very kind.

we’re all a grab bag of good and eveil, and by and large can’t tell which is which

I used to go to the driving range to practice driving without slicing. Now I go to practice slicing without swearing.

I believe I want adult sanity, which seems to me the only unalloyed form of heroism available today.

I like my way of doing things better than your way of not doing them.

When man to man shall be friend and brother.

Swimming upstream in the music business is a hard thing to do.

Love emerges at the point of a lacking word, and one offers one's being to fill the lack.