“Bok strongly believed that good art should find a place in public buildings where large numbers of persons might find easy access to it.”

“The world was an awfully large place and it wasn't easy to find a person who'd gone missing sixty years earlier, even if that person was oneself.”

“Writing is the only art form where a good number of the artists make a slice of their living criticizing one another in print, in public. ”

“you’re lucky that you find life so easy, Felix. You’re lucky that you’re happy, that you know how to be happy, that you’re a good person- and you want everyone to be happy and good because you are, and to find things easy because you do. Do it ever occur to you some people might not find life as easy to live as you do?”

“Perhaps one day she would find a place where she would stay. That would be good. To know that the place you were in was your own place—where you should be.”

“The art of not reading is a very important one. It consists in not taking an interest in whatever may be engaging the attention of the general public at any particular time. When some political or ecclesiastical pamphlet, or novel, or poem is making a great commotion, you should remember that he who writes for fools always finds a large public. A precondition for reading good books is not reading bad ones: for life is short.”