It isn't so astonishing the number of things that I can remember, as the number of things that I can remember that aren't so.

I've seen many troubles in my time, only half of which ever came true.

When I'm playful I use the meridians of longitude and parallels of latitude for a seine, and drag the Atlantic Ocean for whales. ... Life on the Mississippi

What is human life? The first third a good time; the rest remembering about it

Sitting on the floor, I'd replay the past in my head. Funny, that's all I did, day after day after day for half a year, and I never tired of it. What I'd been through seemed so vast, with so many facets. Vast, but real, very real, which was why the experience persisted in towering before me, like a monument lit up at night. And the thing was, it was a monument to me.

You can't depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.