“I heard the opening bar of 'Help' as I headed down Polk Street. Every single time I've heard that tune I've taken it as some message from God, a warning of things to come, a perfect description of my mashed-potato character”

“I've started to have dreams while I'm awake. I remember music I've never heard... I've got all this extra stuff in my head, but I'm forgetting things from my own life. I feel like I'm being taken over.”

“I have heard great music--even sublime music. I've heard music fit for princes, for kings. I have hard music fit for any monarch. But that night, for the first time in my life, I heard music fit for God.”

“Dammit, that yodel of triumph of yours was the most beautiful thing I've ever heard in my life. I wish I had a tape recorder to take it down."Those things aren't made to be heard by the people down below," says Japhy, dead serious.”

“In a few minutes I heard the books' voices: a low, steady, unsupressible hum. I'd heard it many times before. I've always had a finely tuned ear for a library's accumulations of echo and desire. Libraries are anything but hushed.”

“If there was ever a more perfect day in the history of time it isn't one I've heard about.”