"Do you understand now why books are hated and feared? Because they reveal the pores on the face of life. The comfortable people want only the faces of the full moon, wax, faces without pores, hairless, expressionless."
"Everyone must leave something behind when he dies . . . Something your hand touched some way so your soul has somewhere to go when you die . . . It doesn't matter what you do, so long as you change something from the way it was before you touched it into something that's like you after you take your hands away."
"But you can't make people listen. They have to come round in their own time, wondering what happened and why the world blew up around them. It can't last."
"The good writers touch life often. The mediocre ones run a quick hand over her. The bad ones rape her and leave her for the flies."
"Hello!"He said hello and then said, "What are you up to now?""I'm still crazy. The rain feels good. I love to walk in it. "I don't think I'd like that,"he said. "You might if you tried.""I never have."She licked her lips. "Rain even tastes good.""What do you do, go around trying everything once?"he asked. "Sometimes twice."
"The magic is only in what books say, how they stitched the patches of the universe together into one garment for us."