Patriotism in America, as I understand it, is a matter of suffering, when the country fails to live up to its promises, or actively betrays them.

Words that in their everyday surrealism have no parallel in contemporary writing... Music that mines the deep veins of fatalism in the Appalachian voice

We make the oldest stories new when we succeed, and we are trapped by the old stories when we fail

I want another idea, another project, but you can't make them up. They show up.

No failure in America, whether of love or money, is ever simple; it is always a kind of betrayal, of a mass of shadowy, shared hopes.

Every youth movement presents itself as a loan to the future, and tries to call in its lien in advance, but when there is no future all loans are canceled.

It may be that the most interesting American struggle is the struggle to set oneself free from the limits one is born to, and then to learn something of the value of those limits

It is a sure sign that a culture has reached a dead end when it is no longer intrigued by its myths.

Elvis' early music has drama because as he sang he was escaping limits.

If Bob Dylan really is an historian in and of himself in his work, in his performances, he is also an historian with a unique sense of humor. There's always been a bit of a stand-up comic in him.

I never find myself even catching lyrics until something in the sound has taken me captive. Thinking about anything else is just the pleasurable byproduct of wow.

Living in a democratic society means that I can express my opinion, Having a democratic government means that they don't have to listen.

How long will you keep me?" I asked.You shrugged. "Forever, of course.

Man naturally desires, not only to be loved, but to be lovely; or to be that thing which is the natural and proper object of love.

What is this frog and mouse battle among the mathematicians?

Death is every man's final critic. To die well you must live bravely.

The fine emotions whence our lives we mold Lie in the earthly tumult dumb and cold.

See no one loves you more than me...and no one ever will

Bullies are masters at holding others responsible for their misbehavior. Instead of claiming "the devil made me do it", they argue "You made me do it".

Nothing will ever be attempted if all possible objections must first be overcome.

Because faithfulness is not a human question, but a divine one.