"He suddenly saw the enterprise of literature as essentially mad."
- Mark Beauregard
"Original sin is a very commercial idea,” said Duyckinck. “How do you think the Bible stays in print year after year?"
"Melville to Hawthorne: "In your stories, you seem to understand that the dramatic moments come not when a character must choose between right and wrong buy when he must choose between two wrongs."
"Destroying oneself, he thought ruefully, should always be done at a deliberate pace."
"I have been considering the possibility that the facts that can be ascertained about this cheese fail to satisfy because the facts themselves mask a metaphysical truth that can be known only through t..."