“Five Great Charters knit the landTogether linked, hand in handOne in the people who wear the crownTwo in the folk who keep the Dead downThree and Five became stone and mortarFour sees all in frozen water.”

“And all those exclamation marks, you notice? Five? A sure sign of someone who wears his underpants on his head.”

“Never trust a woman who wears mauve, whatever her age may be, or a woman over thirty-five who is fond of pink ribbons.”

“Fictions are merely frozen dreams, linked images with some semblance of structure. They are not to be trusted, no more than the people who create them.”

“I have a deep-down belief that there are folks in the world who are good through and through, and others who came in mean and will go out mean. It's like coffee. Once it's roasted, it all looks brown. Until you pour hot water on it and see what comes out. Folks get into hot water, you see what comes out.”

“One dead body required two men either to bury it or to transport it to the rear. A wounded soldier, on the other hand, immobilized five men for an indeterminate amount of time; and who knew whether it was even worth the effort.”