To do justice to the figure of Kafka in its purity and its peculiar beauty one must never lose sight of one thing: it is the purity and beauty of a failure.

Like ultraviolet rays memory shows to each man in the book of life a script that invisibly and prophetically glosses the text.

The more circumspectly you delay writing down an idea, the more maturely developed it will be on surrendering itself.

Of all the ways of acquiring books, writing them oneself is regarded as the most praiseworthy method.

To be happy is to be able to become aware of oneself without fright.

Work on good prose has three steps: a musical stage when it is composed, an architectonic one when it is built, and a textile one when it is woven.

The only way of knowing a person is to love them without hope.

Quotations in my work are like wayside robbers who leap out armed and relieve the stroller of his conviction.

There is no document of civilization which is not at the same time a document of barbarism.

The concept of progress must be grounded in the idea of catastrophe. That things are 'status quo' is the catastrophe

All human knowledge takes the form of interpretation.

I will not be a victim. I will not think like a victim. I am going to avenge all those little girls. I am going to win.

even after every emotional accident, the show must go on.

When we stop interfering and are wise enough to let the psychophysiological connection work for us instead of against us, our minds rush as quickly as possible towards perfect health.

Beware of "the real world". A speaker's apeal to it is always an invitation not to challenge his tacit assumptions.

In any insurgency there will be people who are irreconcilable and who pose a clear and present threat to the U.S. and our allies.

My high-school papers, my college-application essays, read like Norman Mailer packed in a crunchy-peanut-butter sandwich.

I'm a big competitor.

It is not possible to 'spoil' a child with love and affection...a child needs all the love and affection it can possibly get.

The Social Security trust fund is in pretty good shape today and we should not embark upon risky, dangerous schemes which will, in fact, undermine Social Security, such as privatization.

We ask justice, we ask equality, we ask that all the civil and political rights that belong to citizens of the United States, be guaranteed to us and our daughters forever.