I never think of him as a scholar assaulting me with how much he knows, but as a teacher eager to share a lifelong passion for the subject.

My work has been the education I avoided.

Was the whole matter of aptitudes a myth – a copout used by people like me to avoid subjects that would force us to think inTherefore threatening ways?

Writers are the custodians of memory…

Mind in language are inseparable. If we violate our language we violate ourselves.

Editors are licensed to be curious.

Not everybody has a talent for painting, or for the piano, or for dance. But we can write our way into the artist’s head and into his problems and solutions. Or we can go there...

Even a poor translator couldn’t kill a style that moves with such narrative clarity.

It is possible that the artists are sane and the world they are painting is crazy.

Writers who think THEY are being criticized when only that writing is being criticized are beyond a teacher’s reach. Writing can only be learned when a writer coldly separates himself from what he has written...

Probably every subject is interesting if an avenue into it can be found that has humanity and that an ordinary person can follow.

If a philosophical writer cannot be followed, the difficulty of his subject can be placed only in mitigation of his offense, not in condonation of it. There are too many expert witnesses on the other...

No one has something original or important to say will willing we run the risk of being misunderstood; people who write obscurely are either unskilled in writing or up to mischief

Writing can be taught or learned in the vacuum. We must say to students in every area of knowledge: “This is a how other people have written about this subject. Read it; study it; think...

One of underestimated tasks in nonfiction writing is to impose narrative shape on an unwieldy mass of material.

It’s no fun to think about infinity and no cinche to write about it. Again, it helps to look for some human link.

Writing is the handmaiden of leadership.

The reader is someone with an attention span of about 30 seconds.

Readers must be given room to bring their own emotions to a piece so crammed with emotional content; the writer must tenaciously resist explaining why the material is so moving.

Look for the clutter in your writing and prune it ruthlessly. Be grateful for everything you can throw away. Reexamine each sentence you put on paper. Is every word doing new work? Can any thought...

Motivation clears the head faster than a nasal spray.

What a pleasure it is to be in the company of a writer with enthusiasm for his subject! It doesn’t matter what the subject is; I want and ichthyologists to be as committed to fish...

Writers and learners will write better and learn more if they understand the “why” of what they are studying.