"Perpetual anticipation is good for the soul but it's bad for the heart."

- Stephen Joshua Sondheim

"What he had was what he pretended."

- from Annie Proulx's "The Shipping News"

"Now that he was alone his face looked older."

- from James Joyce's "Two Gallants"

"That time is short and it doesn't return again. It is slipping away while I write this and while you read it, and the monosyllable of the clock is Loss, Loss, Loss, unless you devote your heart to its opposition."

- Tennessee Williams

"Gazing up into the darkness I saw myself as a creature driven and derided by vanity; and my eyes burned with anguish and anger."

- from James Joyce's "Araby"

"Yes, this man was fighting, fighting with words. He was using words as a weapon, using them as one would use a club."

- from Richard Wright's "Black Boy"

"I bought a ticket to the world,
But now I’ve come back again."

- from Spandau Ballet's "True"

"It was like she thought life lasted a really long time and that everything you did didn't matter utterly, that you weren't made of the minutes you spent."

- from Aurelie Sheehan's "The Anxiety of Everyday Objects"

"He said, 'Oh I’m gonna buy a gun and start a war,
If you can tell me something worth fighting for.'"

-from Coldplay's "A Rush of Blood to the Head"

"We do not know why, when we think of them, we feel of a sudden that the earth is good and that it is not a burden to live."

- from Ayn Rand's "Anthem"