Literary criticism now is all pranks and polemics.

Pain narrows consciousness; pleasure blurs it.

When Medusa looks in the mirror, she sees the Lady of Sorrows.

My passions have never jumped out of the fireplace and set fire to the carpet.

Retirement requires the invention of a new hedonism, not a return to the hedonism of youth

The sewing machine joins what the scissors have cut asunder, plus whatever else comes in its path.

Clothes make a statement. Costumes tell a story.

The laughter of the aphorism is sometimes triumphant, but seldom carefree.

'Be faithful to your roots' is the liberal version of 'Stay in your ghetto.'

Every day begins with an act of courage and hope: getting out of bed.

Totem poles and wooden masks no longer suggest tribal villages but fashionable drawing rooms in New York and Paris.

...having bowed to the inevitability of the dictum that we must eat to live, we should ignore it and live to eat...

Don't resist the urge to burn down the stronghold, kill off the main love interest or otherwise foul up the lives of your characters.

God takes care of imbeciles, little children and artists.

90% trust peers on social networks (even strangers); only 15-18% trust brands.

Deprived of the company of fools, a great wit does not seem half so clever.

Our God is a forgiving God.

Climate change is due to the use of energy for industrial growth, which has been and is overwhelmingly based on fossil fuels.

Eliminating the death penalty...will not hinder the prosecutorial capacity to seek, or the court's ability to impose, 'life without parole' sentences for serious, heinous crimes and criminals.

It's very clearly stated in the film: You make your own choices, and what you're always fighting is ego.

What molting time is to birds, so adversity or misfortune is ... for us humans.