“He was like a lot of Warmbloods, massive and showy and a bit of a dumb jock...”

“-"What's that for?"-"Have a little bread with your ice cream," she told me.”

“-And I'm sorry too.-For what?-For calling you an asshole doctor.-That's okay.-Even though, technically, that is what you are.”

“So many people consider their work a daily punishment. Whereas I love my work as a translator. Translation is a journey over a sea from one shore to the other. Sometimes I think of myself as a smuggler: I cross the frontier of language with my booty of words, ideas, images, and metaphors.”

“We tend to overestimate the effect of a technology in the short run and underestimate the effect in the long run.”

“As the children were sitting there eating pears, a girl came walking along the road from town. When she saw the children she stopped and asked, "Have you seen my papa go by?""M-m-m," said Pippi. "How did he look? Did he have blue eyes?""Yes," said the girl."Medium large, not too tall and not too short?""Yes," said the girl."Black hat and black shoes?""Yes, exactly," said the girl eagerly."No, that one we haven't seen," said Pippi decidedly.”

“At least, not in this country,' she added after a moment's thought. 'In China it's a little different. Once I saw a Chinaman in Shanghai. His ears were so big he could use them for a raincoat. When it rained, he just crept in under his ears and was warm and snug as could be. Not that the ears had such a rattling good time of it, you understand. If it was specially bad weather, he'd invite friends and acquaintances to pitch camp under his ears too. There they sat, singing their sorrowful songs while it poured down outside.”