The function of literature, through all its mutations, has been to make us aware of the particularity of selves, and the high authority of the self in its quarrel with its society and its culture. Literature is in that sense subversive. ↗
The government doesn't really prosecute for polygamy anymore, but a lot of the arrests are of groups supporting themselves through welfare scams or for child abuse. So that was all I'd really heard about polygamists. ↗
You hear about these shows where there are all these women are supposedly always in a catfight, and then you find out in reality that they're all getting along fine. ↗
But then in novels the most indifferent hero comes out right at last. Some god comes out of a theatrical cloud and leaves the poor devil ten thousand-a-year and a title. ↗
Dance with a girl three times, and if you like the light of her eye and the tone of voice with which she, breathless, answers your little questions about horseflesh and music about affairs masculine and feminine, then take the leap in the dark. ↗
It may almost be a question whether such wisdom as many of us have in our mature years has not come from the dying out of the power of temptation, rather than as the results of thought and resolution. ↗
The true picture of life as it is, if it could be adequately painted, would show men what they are, and how they might rise, not, indeed to perfection, but one step first, and then another on the ladder. ↗
There are some achievements which are never done in the presence of those who hear of them. Catching salmon is one, and working all night is another. ↗
