“if I was a painter, and was to paint the American Eagle, how should I do it?...I should want to draw it like a Bat, for its short-sightedness; like a Bantam. for its bragging; like a Magpie, for its honesty; like a Peacock, for its vanity; like an Ostrich, for putting its head in the mud, and thinking nobody sees it -' ...'And like a Phoenix, for its power of springing from the ashes of its faults and vices, and soaring up anew into the sky!”

“The sky is like a monochromatic contemporay painting, drawing me in its illusion of depth, pulling me up.”

“The way I see it, you should live everyday like its your birthday”

“If... if I didn't try to get my life moving on my own account, I should think it just absurd to go on living.'A look of smiling obstinacy had come into Marcelle's face.'Yes, yes - it's your vice.''It's not a vice. It's how I'm made.''Why aren't other people made like that, if it isn't a vice?''They are, only they don't know it.”

“I guess I just don't get the point. It's like, why should you bother getting attached to anything if,A: It's never gonna last, andB: It hurts like hell when it's over?”

“I read books, but I do it because I want to - because it's like an escape in my head, like being with you.”