...the demands of writing and of real life are not always similar.

In the world according to Garp, we are all terminal cases

They were involved in that awkward procedure of getting to unknow each other.

In a school community, someone who reads a book for some secretive purpose, other than discussing it, is strange. What was she reading for?

As Garp put it, 'You only grow by coming to the end of something and by beginning something else.' Even if these so-called endings and beginnings are illusions.

...nearly everything seems a letdown after a writer has finished writing something.

Give a bowl of rice to a man and you will feed him for a day. Teach him how to grow his own rice and you will save his life.

Evolution could so easily be disproved if just a single fossil turned up in the wrong date order. Evolution has passed this test with flying colours.

We prayed the moon would unstopper long enough to suck us through to the other side so we could see how dull the stars were at their backsides.

Such was the cyclical nature of Galway life: finding tragedy in the simple things and simplicity in the tragic things.

Communication always has a purpose. Before speaking, the first law is: you must know why you are talking. You must know what you are communicating for. What do you want?

You think publishing is tough but the music world is ten times tougher.

These powers of imagination and creativity are among the few things that set us apart from the rest of life on Earth. But they make all the difference.

I'm not the type who spends his free time in training camp playing with his Playstation or playing cards on trips. The other players thought it was odd: There he is, reading again.

But my hands are in the right place." "Heart," I corrected. "Your heart's in the right place." "Yeah, but my hands are in an even better place." And so they were.

Good physicians are rarely dispassionate. They agonize and self-doubt over patients.