“Ouch, my butthole hurts, but I really need to have a look at that firestation.”

“It'll always be easier to fight others if you reduce them to a single word or look at them just one way.”

“Because with time blocking out the bad, memory is always bound to be a bit naive and stupidly optimistic.”

“Actually, the Burmese don't refer to her by name. They just call her "The Lady." It's like Voldemort in Harry Potter, "He Who Must Not Be Named.”

“Too many people learn about war with no inconvenience to themselves. They read about Verdun or Stalingrad without comprehension, sitting in a comfortable armchair, with their feet beside the fire, preparing to go about their business the next day, as usual. One should really read such accounts under compulsion, in discomfort, considering oneself fortunate not to be describing the events in a letter home, writing from a hole in the mud. One should read about war in the worst circumstances, when everything is going badly, remembering that the torments of peace are trivial, and not worth any white hairs. Nothing is really serious in the tranquility of peace; only an idiot could be really disturbed by a question of salary. One should read about war standing up, late at night, when one is tired, as I am writing about it now, at dawn, while my asthma attack wears off. And even now, in my sleepless exhaustion, how gentle and easy peace seems!”

“I have written less than most writers. But I have drunk far more than most drinkers.”

“then he jumped..I owe him so much. I needed him. I still do.But he's gone.He told me once that I shouldn't make people into heroes. He said that heroes didn't exist and that even if they did he wouldn't be one of them.which goes to show. he wasn't right about everything..”