“God pity the poor novelist.”

“Others saw in the trend still another instance of a disturbing tendency in the American suburb: the longing for withdrawal, for self-enclosure, for expensive isolation.”

“So imagine a fire going -- wood snapping the way it does when it’s a little green — the wind rattling the windows behind the curtains -- and one of those Chopin melodies that feel like sorrow and ecstasy all mixed together pouring from the keys -- and you have my idea of happiness. Or just reading, reading and lamplight, the sound of pages turning. And so you dare to be happy. You do that thing. You dare.”

“All words are masks and the lovelier they are, the more they are meant to conceal.”

“His ambition was to insert his dreams into the world, and if they were the wrong dreams, then he would dream them in solitude.”

“Ennui had more distractions far more amusing than the automatons of a watchmaker in Mühlenberg.”

“Then solar systems, galaxies, supernovas, infinite space itself will become elements of a final masterwork--a never-ending festival, a celestial amusement park in which every exploding star and spinning electron is part of the empyreal choreography.”