“[when]asked, “What should I do if I want to become a writer?”“Well,” Doris said, with that steely twinkle in her dark eyes, “My best advice foryou, honey, is to stop if you possibly can! And if you just can’t, then get ready to worklike hell. Hang onto your day job. And remember, you may not make a living, but you’llmake a wonderful life.”

“If you are going to be underestimated by people who speak more rapidly, the temptation is to speak slowly and strategically and outwit them.”

“Often our students see nothing about religious faith except the lowest common denominator. They see nothing but TV evangelists and fools, and it doesn't occur to them that intelligent people might find this religious business worth living their lives by.”

“Dr. Doris Parker: I have your ten week report. You know what it says "F, F, F… ". Do you know what that means? It means you don't care.Student: You're brilliant. (Pause) Can I go now?Dr. Doris Parker: (Sarcastic laugh) God! you're shallow, disgusting creature. You wanna know the truth? Dr. Doris Parker: One, you're not gonna be in a band or a model missy because you have no ambition. With no skills you'd be competing with 80 percent of US work force for minimum wage job which you will work at for the rest of your life, till you're replaced by a computer.Student: I don't care!Dr. Doris Parker: The only talent you ever have is *insult*. Your life will basically become a carnival of pain and when you can't stand not one more day, not one more hour, it will get worse, much worse. Every day I come to this office and I listen to you kids *insult* all over your selves. It is so easy to be careless, it takes courage and character to care. Not that you have any of those qualities.”

“Bad enough that getting turned on when he had nothing more than a bath towel to hide it would make the condition kind of hard to miss, but getting turned on in front of his ex-fiancee was akin to smearing honey on his junk and walking into grizzly territory.”

“What's terrible is to pretend that second-rate is first-rate. To pretend that you don't need love when you do; or you like your work when you know quite well you're capable of better.”

“Ideally, what should be said to every child, repeatedly, throughout his or her school life is something like this: 'You are in the process of being indoctrinated. We have not yet evolved a system of education that is not a system of indoctrination. We are sorry, but it is the best we can do. What you are being taught here is an amalgam of current prejudice and the choices of this particular culture. The slightest look at history will show how impermanent these must be. You are being taught by people who have been able to accommodate themselves to a regime of thought laid down by their predecessors. It is a self-perpetuating system. Those of you who are more robust and individual than others will be encouraged to leave and find ways of educating yourself — educating your own judgements. Those that stay must remember, always, and all the time, that they are being moulded and patterned to fit into the narrow and particular needs of this particular society.”