We read frequently if unknowingly, in quest of a mind more original than our own.

Everyone wants a prodigy to fail; it makes our mediocrity more bearable.

The most beautiful prose paragraph yet written by any American.

We read, frequently if not unknowingly, in search of a mind more original than our own.

I realized early on that the academy and the literary world alike

It is hard to go on living without some hope of encountering the extraordinary.

Shakespeare is the true multicultural author. He exists in all languages. He is put on the stage everywhere. Everyone feels that they are represented by him on the stage.

At our present bad moment, we need above all to recover our sense of literary individuality and of poetic autonomy.

Read deeply, not to believe, not to accept, not to contradict, but to learn to share in that one nature that writes and reads.

Reading well is one of the greatest pleasures that solitude can afford you.

The art and passion of reading well and deeply is waning, but [Jane] Austen still inspires people to become fanatical readers.

If [Jesus] felt that He had to pray, how much more do we need to pray!

Life is learning to take God's hand.....and hold on.

...The sea... some have said is nothing but a library of all the tears in history.

One is least sure of one's self, sometimes, when one is most positive.

Winning often teaches you about losing and losing often teaches you about winning and a lot of things also happen by luck and you have to be at the right place at the right time.

You better arm yourselves to answer your children's and grandchildren's questions... no matter what the question is... without being judgmental.

If you can remember the sixties, you weren't there.

All babies are incoherent, but they grow up. That is the principle difference between an infant and a poet.

The splendor of a soul in grace is so seductive that it surpasses the beauty of all created things.

Moments like this are buds on the tree of life. Flowers of darkness they are.