“He was his usual philosophic self and tried very hard to explain to me that although life was stained with agony, this was necessary. That scars only concealed, and finally helped to reveal, an essential peace. He said that what we, who pass so swiftly, experience as songs of love or cries of pain are only overtones to a single note in a very much larger harmony.”

“You love me,” he said slowly, wonderingly. Then with greater certainty, “By God, you love me.” His astonished laugh ended on a choked note as he snatched her hand. “So much,” she said huskily. Her fingers curled hard around his. “So very, very much.”

“A writer is dear and necessary for us only in the measure of which he reveals to us the inner workings of his very soul.”

“Infinite Jest not only says that being human is hard work; it makes us work hard. It not only suggests we put ourselves in service to something larger than ourselves; it is one of those larger somethings. That's its rhetorical genius, and is how Wallace gets his self-help “to fly at such a high altitude”: Like AA, it is theory and praxis in a single stroke. Or: It is what it says, which may be the purest form of art.”

“GO FOR HIS EYES! OR BITE HIM ON THE NOSE! DRAGON NOSES ARE VERY SENSITIVE!"Oh, very helpful, Camicazi, very helpful...thought Hiccup. What if he doesn't obligingly hold me up to his nose? What if the only part I get close to is the TEETH?”

“No man knows how bad he is till he has tried very hard to be good. . .Only those who try to resist temptation know how strong it is.”