Television’s perfect. You turn a few knobs, a few of those mechanical adjustments at which the higher apes are so proficient, and lean back and drain your mind of all thought. And there you are...

I had a funny feeling as I saw the house disappear, as though I had written a poem and it was very good and I had lost it and would never remember it again.

She poured us some more Scotch. It didn’t seem to affect her any more than water affects Boulder Dam.

After six long hours of driving and three rest stops, Tiger pulls up to a snow-topped, metal speaker box just outside the State Penitentiary’s first gate in Walla Walla. As he rolls down his window...