Patrick O'Neill

“[I]ndividual readers may conceivably choose (or be led) to regard a given text as literary in cases where such a response is not shared by others, but until their individual responses lose their idiosyncratic nature by being adopted by a larger interpretive community, such responses will be regarded as being to a greater or lesser degree aberrant, and the offender will be regarded as lacking in good taste or good sense or both.”

“Believing that, even though you are not personally in control of everything that happens, that even as our days are numbered and death comes for the righteous and the wise just as it does for the foolish and the wicked – that even lost as we are among the stars – your life nevertheless counts for something that is original and unique, a one-time-only appearance of your personality here on earth, something to be appreciated and maximized, made the most of, every day.”