“Why . . .” she begins. “Why do you want to climb it?”“Because it’s there.”

“Men who read a lot have a more sensitive disposition, added Fowler. [...]I did not know what to say to this.Maybe reading is a sort of curse is all I mean, concluded Fowler. Maybe it's better for a man to stay inside his own mind.Amen, I felt like saying, although I do not know why.”

“In the beginning was the Word.In the end . . . past honor, past life, past caring . . .In the end will be the Word.”

“You want to be a hero,” he repeated. “You want to be one of those rare human beings who make history, rather than merely watch it flow around them like water around a rock.”

“In the beginning was the Word. Then came the fucking word processor. Then came the thought processor. Then came the death of literature. And so it goes.”

“Do you think it's ready?" I [Silenus, The Poet] asked. "It's perfect... a masterpiece.""Do you think it'll sell?" I asked. "No fucking way.”

“Want to talk about Shakespeare's sonnets?" asked Orphu of Io.Are you shitting me?" The moravecs loved the ancient human colloquial phrases, the more scatological the better.Yes," said Orphu. "I am most definitely shitting you, my friend.”