Immature artists imitate. Mature artists steal.

We are at heart so profoundly anarchistic that the only form of state we can imagine living in is Utopian; and so cynical that the only Utopia we can believe in is authoritarian.

Where misunderstanding serves others as an advantage, one is helpless to make oneself understood.

Being a Jew is like walking in the wind or swimming: you are touched at all points and conscious everywhere.

The poet is in command of his fantasy, while it is exactly the mark of the neurotic that he is possessed by his fantasy.

What marks the artist is his power to shape the material of pain we all have.

It is now life and not art that requires the willing suspension of disbelief.

Unless we insist that politics is imagination and mind, we will learn that imagination and mind are politics, and of a kind we will not like.

It is possible that the contemplation of cruelty will not make us humane but cruel; that the reiteration of the badness of our spiritual condition will make us consent to it.

The immature artist imitates. The mature artist steals.

We who are liberal and progressive know that the poor are our equals in every sense except that of being equal to us.

Envy yearns to find flaws.

The summer in youcalms the winter in me.

I've never been to Harvard, I've never been to college, so I don't know what dorm life is like.

Some people you shouldn't kid, even if they deserve it.

In the corridors under tehre is nothing but sleep. And stiller than ever on orchard boughs they keep Tryst with the moon, and deep is the silence, deep On moon-washed apples of wonder.

Somebody is always hiding something.

I have been photographed to death.

Anything you strive to hold captive will hold you captive, and if you desire freedom you must give freedom.

So why did you get shot? One of your witticisms go awry? (Nekoda)

Contrary to what many may think, immortality is not a fairy tale invented to compensate for an unhappy life.