I realised that reading was the key that opened the door to secret lands, strange places and the worlds behind other people's eyes.

Can we really be friends with those who don't love the books that we do? Of course we can, but can we really be friends with those who don't love any books? I'm not so sure of that.

I learned that books could be collected, that they were important enough to keep and that a story that seemed to be over could be part of a bigger one.

That's what reading was for my mother, and became for me - a way to escape, a private time machine, a place that began with moral instruction but soon morphed into empathy and imagination.

That's what is so precious in reading this way - you can plumb the depths of another's experience while sitting still with a book in your hands.

There is a perfect rout of characters in every man—and every man is like an actor’s trunk, full of strange creatures, new & old. But an actor and his trunk are two different things

It’s free to feed your mind and your mind feeds your body

It is important to me to instill in [kids] a sense of compassion and respect for others.

We stood back-to-back, blocking and striking in harmony; sometimes it felt like his arms and legs were an extension of me. I could count on him to keep them off me from behind.

An investment in education always pays the highest returns.

Evil comes up softly like a flower.

At this point you are so far away from what you really are, it's ridiculous.

A military man can scarcely pride himself on having smitten a sleeping enemy; it is more a matter of shame, simply, for the one smitten.

All my album artwork is body painting.

[T]he historian lays humanity on the couch.