Literature was the passport to enter a larger life; that is, the zone of freedom. Literature was freedom. Especially in a time in which the values of… - Susan Sontag

It hurts to love. It's like giving yourself to be flayed and knowing that at any moment the other person may just walk off with your skin.

The United States is a generically religious society. That is, in the United States it's not important which religion you adhere to, as long as you have one.

To have a museum chronicling the great crime that was African slavery in the United States of America would be to acknowledge that the evil was here. Americans prefer to picture the evil that was there, and from which the United States-a unique nation, one without any certifiably wicked leaders throughout its entire history-is exempt. That this country, like every other country, has its tragic past does not sit well with the founding, and still all-powerful belief in American exceptionalism.