We Live, We Die, We Are Remembered,

I Had Wanted Life Not To Bother Me Too Much, And Had Succeeded - And How Pitiful That Was.

You Get Towards The End Of Life - No, Not Life Itself, But Of Something Else: The End Of Any Likelihood Of Change In That Life. You Are Allowed A Long Moment Of Pause, Time Enough To Ask The Question: What Else Have I Done Wrong?

Great Books Are Readable Anyway. Dickens Is Readable. Jane Austen Is Readable. John Updike's Readable. Hawthorne's Readable. It's A Meaningless Term. You Have To Go The Very Extremes Of Literature, Like Joyce's "finnegan's Wake," Before You Get A Literary Work That Literally Unreadable.

Books Say: She Did This Because. Life Says: She Did This. Books Are Where Things Are Explained To You; Life Is Where Things Aren't. I'm Not Surprised Some People Prefer Books.

In Those Days, We Imagined Ourselves As Being Kept In Some Kind Of Holding Pen, Waiting To Be Released Into Our Lives. And When The Moment Came, Our Lives -- And Time Itself -- Would Speed Up. How Were We To Know That Our Lives Had In Any Case Begun, That Some Advantage Had Already Been Gained, Some Damage Already Inflicted? Also, That Our Release Would Only Be Into A Larger Holding Pen, Whose Boundaries Would Be At First Undiscernible.