It's not what you like but what you are like that's important.

There had been times when he knew, somewhere in him, that he would get used to it, whatever it was, because he had learnt that some hard things became softer after a very little while.

For alarmingly large chunks of an average day, I am a moron.

One could argue that most of the trouble in the world is caused by introspection.

Most people have a rope that ties them to someone, and that rope can be short or it can be long. (Be long. Belong. Get it?) You don't know how long, though. It's not your choice.

It's no wonder we're all such a mess, is it? We're like Tom Hanks in Big. Little boys and girls trapped in adult bodies and forced to get on with it.

I'm a good person. In most ways. But I'm beginning to think that being a good person in most ways doesn't count for anything very much, if you're a bad person in one way.

I read the fuck out of every book I can get my hands on.

It seems to me now that the plain state of being human is dramatic enough for anyone; you don't need to be a heroin addict or a performance poet to experience extremity. You just have to love someone.

If you really wanted to mess me up, you should have got to me earlier.

Telling me I can do anything I want is like pulling the plug out of the bath and then telling the water it can go anywhere it wants. Try it, and see what happens.

We spent all those years talking about stuff we had in common, and the last few months noticing all the ways we were different and it broke both of our hearts.

…I've had a bad week." What's happened?" Nothing's happened. I've had a bad week in my head, is all.

I've been thinking with my guts since I was fourteen years old, and frankly speaking, between you and me, I have come to the conclusion that my guts have shit for brains.

I lost the plot for a while then. And I lost the subplot, the script, the soundtrack, the intermission, my popcorn, the credits, and the exit sign.

Even bad times have good things in them to make you feel alive.

When you're unhappy, I guess everything in the world - reading, eating, sleeping - has something buried somewhere inside it that just makes you unhappier.

It's no good pretending that any relationship has a future if your record collections disagree violently or if your favorite films wouldn't even speak to each other if they met at a party.

The plain state of being human is dramatic enough for anyone; you don't need to be a heroin addict or a performance poet to experience extremity. You just have to love someone.

What came first – the music or the misery? Did I listen to the music because I was miserable? Or was I miserable because I listened to the music? Do all those records turn you into a melancholy person?

Sarcasm and compassion are two of the qualities that make life on Earth tolerable.

Hard is trying to rebuild yourself, piece by piece, with no instruction book, and no clue as to where all the important bits are supposed to go.

It's brilliant, being depressed; you can behave as badly as you like.

Sentimental music has this great way of taking you back somewhere at the same time that it takes you forward, so you feel nostagic and hopeful all at the same time.

Everyone knows how to talk, and no one knows what to say.

I've committed to nothing...and that's just suicide...by tiny, tiny increments.

I'm very good at the past. It's the present I can't understand.