It's a landscape that has to be seen to be believed. And, as I say on occasion, it may have to be believed in order to be seen.

I wonder if, in the dark night of the sea, the octopus dreams of me.

In the beginning was the word, and it was spoken.

Anything is bearable if you can make a story out of it.

A word has power in and of itself. It comes from nothing into sound and meaning; it gives origin to all things.

If you believe in the power of words, you can bring about physical changes in the universe.

Words were medicine; they were magic and invisible. They came from nothing into sound and meaning. They were beyond price; they could neither be bought nor sold.

I sometimes think the contemporary white American is more culturally deprived than the Indian.

Indians are marvelous storytellers. In some ways, that oral tradition is stronger than the written tradition.

For the storyteller, for the arrowmaker, language does indeed represent the only chance for survival.

The highest human purpose is always to reinvent and celebrate the sacred.

Death is more universal than life

No one can see very clearly inside the heavy fog, no one but the fog himself!

That's what is most satisfying, is having overcome that pain. Pain that is so intense that when you finish, it feels like you're going to die. That's what I wanted, and that's what I got.

Peace comes from within; do not try to seek it without.

The world is a country which nobody ever yet knew by description; one must travel through it one's self to be acquainted with it.

I made the choice long ago to write about real life. And life is both serious and funny.

Men of sound sense have Law for their god, but men without sense Pleasure.

No government may remain strong by ignoring the commandments given to Moses on Mount Sinai.

I never succeed in painting scenes, however beautiful, immediately upon returning from them. I must wait for a time to draw a veil over the common details.

My soul, you can have it. I'd sell it to the devil for another hit. I hear voices.