A library is the only single place you can go to learn something new, be comforted, terrified, thrilled, saddened, overjoyed, or excited all in one day. And for free.
Radio is the theater of the mind; television is the theater of the mindless
One of the nice things about problems is that a good many of them do not exist except in our imaginations.
Ours is a government of checks and balances. The Mafia and crooked businessmen make out checks, and the politicians and other compromised officials improve their bank balances.
Thousands of years ago only Christ could walk on the water. Today anybody can do it; you just step on the garbage.
Without laughter life on our planet would be intolerable. So important is laughter to us that humanity highly rewards members of one of the most unusual professions on earth, those who make a living by inducing laughter in others. This is very strange if you stop to think of it: that otherwise sane and responsible citizens should devote their professional energies to causing others to make sharp, explosive barking-like exhalations.
In a rational society we would want our presidents to be teachers. In our actual society we insist they be cheerleaders.
Why should a man be in love with his fetters, though of gold?
We're painting the same people all our life - it's just the way we look at them that changes. If you experience trauma, you can speak about it in so many different ways. You can speak about landscape, you can speak about your food; it's always different. Trauma is the beginning of life as an artist.
Romantic love is an obsession. It possesses you. You lose your sense of self. You can’t stop thinking about another human being.
A parent may be without a job, but no child should be without a doctor.