Last words are always harder to remember when no one knows that someone’s about to die. John Green I’ve always liked the apocryphal story of George V’s last words. In response to his doctor, who, for encouragement to the dying King, offered, “You’ll soon be well and able to visit…

Dorothy: “How can you talk if you haven’t got a brain?” Scarecrow: “I don’t know… But some people without brains do an awful lot of talking… don’t they?” The Wizard of Oz Until I moved to Wiltshire ten years ago, I had not come across a Scarecrow Festival or Trail…

I am never sure of time or place upon a Railroad. I can’t read, I can’t think, I can’t sleep — I can only dream. …

My grandfather’s name was Arthur, and he talked all the time about his arthritis but pronounced it autha-itis, so for months I thought it was a condition unique to him, that he had his own special burden Michael Kleber-Diggs I was in my early forties when I first felt the…

Only an America which practices what it preaches about equal rights and social justice will be respected by those whose choice affects our future. …

Never get out of the boat…never get out of the boat…I got to remember: never get out of the boat Chef — Apocalypse Now (screenplay by John Milius and Francis Ford Coppola) The Highways Agency is running a campaign to advise people on what action to take should their car…

I do believe that art is as important to the human psyche and physical body as air is, as oxygen, as water. And alas, because it’s not something we can quantify reliably, we tend to think art is a luxury. Art is not a luxury. The artist is so necessary…

.. Each herself, but each the other In a curious harmony, Finding both a proper place In the silken gown’s embrace. Eileen O’Shaughnessy — closing lines of ‘End of the Century, 1984’ On occasion, I leaf through my journals, searching for a recollection of a particular occurrence. …

When I got older I decided I wanted to be a real writer. I tried to write about real things. I wanted to describe the world, because to live in an undescribed world was too lonely Nicole Krauss — The History of Love Last week, I went to a leaving…