But philosophically, emotionally: to be so solitary, in so hostile a world: it must affect your entire outlook.” “The Yomeshta would say that man’s singularity is his divinity.”

yet each of them lacked some quality, some dimension of being; and they failed to convince. They were not quite solid.

Alone, I cannot change your world. But I can be changed by it. Alone, I must listen, as well as speak. Alone, the relationship I finally make, if I make one, is not impersonal and not only political: it is individual, it is personal, it is both more and less than political.

For it seemed to me, and I think to him, that it was from that sexual tension between us, admitted now and understood, but not assuaged, that the great and sudden assurance of friendship between us rose: a friendship so much needed by us both in our exile, and already so well proved in the days and nights of our bitter journey, that it might as

It was, I thought, as if they did not cast shadows.

To learn which questions are unanswerable, and not to answer them: this skill is most needful in times of stress and darkness.

One of the most dangerous is the implication that civilization, being artificial, is unnatural: that it is the opposite of primitiveness.

“Good night, Ai,” said the alien, and the other alien said, “Good night, Harth.”

He was after something surer, the sure, quick, and lasting way to make people into a nation: war.