“I think novelists are in the education business, really, but they're not teaching you times tables, they are teaching you responsiveness and morality and to make nuanced judgments. And really to just make the planet look a bit richer when you go out into the street.”

“What makes you think you’re so special? Just because you’re a teacher? What he was really saying was: You are so special. You are my teacher. Then teach me, help me, Hey, Teach, I’m lost—which way do I go? I’m tired of going up the down staircase.”

“It was easy to be moral when that was the way you felt anyway. The hard bit about morality was making yourself feel the opposite of what you really felt.”

“When you want to teach children to think, you begin by treating them seriously when they are little, giving them responsibilities, talking to them candidly, providing privacy and solitude for them, and making them readers and thinkers of significant thoughts from the beginning. That’s if you want to teach them to think.”

“If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; but if you really make them think, they'll hate you.”

“If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; But if you really make them think, they'll hate you.”