The radio station was playing Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake, a sure sign that things were much worse than they appeared.

Reading is entering into the consciousness of another human being.

The love I felt for her on that train ride had a capital and provinces, parishes and a Vatican, an orange planet and many sullen moons -- it was systemic and it was complete.

If you stop thinking, if you stop wondering, you die.

The fading light is us, and we are, for a moment so brief (...) beautiful.

Good fiction makes me turn off all the other parts of my brain, so that I become quiet and submissive, entirely at the mercy of the work at hand.

She took my hand and pulled me after her, her shoulders giving off a sweet peppermint concoction that the bodies of young women sometimes produce to make my life more difficult.

If my mother hadn't tried to sell me chicken Kiev cutlets for $1.40 after I graduated from college, maybe I would've been the lawyer she wanted me to be.

You are not what you want. You are what wants you back.

Forget the fountain of youth, pal of mine. You can live to be a thousand, and it won't matter. Mediocrities like you deserve immortality.

If you read only one memoir by a disaffected, urban, 20-something Jewish girl this year, make it this one. Shukert rocks the lulav.

There are only two kinds of people who are really fascinating- people who know absolutely everything, and people who know absolutely nothing.

It is crucial that members of Congress cast votes that are supportive of the values upon which our nation was founded: equality, freedom, and opportunity for all people.

Outward success alienates a man from himself.

Culture is for old people. When you're young you have your body, and that's all you need.

Sometimes the small pleasures in life are the sweetest.

If I'd known it was going to take 25 years, I'd have started earlier.

Planning is not my friend. Impulse is.

What I know for sure is that what you give comes back to you.

Man is in love and loves what vanishes, What more is there to say?