Tyranny will make an entire population into readers of poetry.

Cherish your human connections: your relationships with friends and family.

What I like about cities is that everything is king size, the beauty and the ugliness.

Twentieth-century Russian literature has produced nothing special except perhaps one novel and two stories by Andrei Platonov, who ended his days sweeping streets.

How delightful to find a friend in everyone.

There are worse crimes than burning books. One of them is not reading them.

For darkness restores what light cannot repair.

I sit in the dark. And it would be hard to figure out which is worse; the dark inside, or the darkness out.

Geography blended with time equals destiny.

Life—the way it really is—is a battle not between good and bad, but between bad and worse

Poetry is what is gained in translation.

What kind of God is it who's upset by a cartoon in Da

Angels, angels, always near, protecting you, my special dear!

My father loved poetry and music. But deep in himself he thought teaching the finest thing a person could do.

I've been told over and over not to go on the Bill Maher show. Well, my best moments have happened on the Bill Maher show. It's been magic for me.

God's angels often protect his servants from potential enemies.

I decided I would go to Chicago and try my luck as a writer after those eight months as a fireman.

Even if it's other people, like on MySpace pages, we're just as collective of enthusiasts now. That seems to be the world we're in.

As long as the sun rises over Ontario and sets over the Pacific, I will dedicate myself to bringing the people of Oregon what they want and need most - an era of hope, change, and economic renewal.

All natural goods perish. Riches take wings; fame is a breath; love is a cheat; youth and health and pleasure vanish.