“The artist must be blind to distinction between 'recognized' or 'unrecognized' conventions of form, deaf to the transitory teaching and demands of his particular age.”

“a good marriage would be between a blind wife and a deaf husband.”

“Romantic poses aside, let us recognize that "falling in love"...is an inferior state of mind, a form of transitory imbecility.”

“Still,[...] in all forms of comics the sequential artist relies upon the tacit cooperation of the reader. This cooperation is based upon the convention of reading and the common cognitive disciplines. Indeed, it is this very voluntary cooperation, so unique to comics, that underlies the contract between artist and audience.”

“We can no longer allow them to write just stories and poems; we must teach them the forms of nonfiction writing as well, specifically that of writing on demand.”

“The artist's transcendence is achieved through success at diagnosing and naming the maladies of the age. Artists tell a different sort of truth than scientists do. The truth of the scientist is a generalizing truth, while the artist or writer's is a particular truth. It is the truth about particular persons in particular situations. The poet or the novelist reveals truths about human lives by embodying these truths in concrete characters, in specific situations. Readers recognize their own reality in the work. We find ourselves saying, as we read, 'Yes! This is how it is for me.' Both those who enjoy the work of artists and the artists themselves achieve transcendence through this identification of the particular truths about selves in the world.”