“Having to accept hominoids as real will require having to acknowledge that the prehuman fossil record is comprised entirely of their bones, rather than ours.”

“they were a closed society, not ready even for a biological intruder”

“Nothing we design or make ever really works??? Everything we design and make is an improvisation, a lash-up, something inept and provisional.”

“I could have run after him. I could have asked politely for some clarification. But I didn’t I knew what I preferred, and that was—I didn’t want to know. Rather, I wanted to believe.”

“We have all lost our possessions and many of us our homes," he said. "But these losses, severe though they may seem, remind us of what no person can take, and that is our minds and our imaginations.”

“He was a great poet" They lamented.No, he was not a great poet," said Theo, "He was a good poet, he could have been better. That's the real loss don't you see?”

“We don't need to have just one favorite. We keep adding favorites. Our favorite book is always the book that speaks most directly to us at a particular stage in our lives. And our lives change. We have other favorites that give us what we most need at that particular time. But we never lose the old favorites. They're always with us. We just sort of accumulate them.”