I am not, and never was, and never could have been, a brutal scoundrel.

Knowing you have something good to read before bed is among the most pleasurable of sensations.

And the rest is rust and stardust.

Do not be angry with the rain; it simply does not know how to fall upwards.

Mind you, sometimes the angels smoke, hiding it with their sleeves, and when the archangel comes, they throw the cigarettes away: that’s when you get shooting stars.

Curiosity is insubordination in its purest form.

Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta.

The writer's job is to get the main character up a tree, and then once they are up there, throw rocks at them.

There are aphorisms that, like airplanes, stay up only while they are in motion.

I think it is all a matter of love: the more you love a memory, the stronger and stranger it is.

Loneliness as a situation can be corrected, but as a state of mind it is an incurable illness.

Love is the divinity of two souls in oneness of spirit!

- You see a man and you just play with him, because you know you can.- I play with women too. I believe in equal rights, she said, looking in the mirror.

Nicola would have to speak up, Jacob would have to shut up, and he would have to man up.

I was in '78 recently, " he announced. "I brought you this."He handed me a single by the Beatles. I didn't recognize the title."Didn't they split in '70?""Not always. How are things?

The light was cut to lace by the trees that had grown so thick with leaves in the last few months.

I can find only three kinds of business in the Universe: mine, yours, and God's.

I will never look at you in the same way ever again. I'll never be that girl again. The girl who comes running back every time you push her away, the girl who loves you anyway.

Intellectually religious emotions are not creative but conservative. They attach themselves readily to the current view of the world and consecrate it.

A space in Paradise equivalent to the size of a foot would be better than the world and what is in it.

Man is a slow, sloppy and brilliant thinker; the machine is fast, accurate and stupid.