Quotes from Helen DeWitt

I said I liked Amundsen and Scott and I liked King Solomon's Mines and I liked everything by Dumas and I liked The Bad Seed and The Hound of the Baskervilles and I liked The Name of the Rose but the Italian was rather difficult.

Poor wretched beasts (said he) Why gave we you t'a mortall king? De dumty dumty dum De dumty dumty dumty dum de dumty dumty dum? De dumty dumty dumty dum de dumty dumty dum? Of all the miserable'st things that breathe and creepe on earth, No one more wretched is then man. And for your deathless birth, Hector must faile to make you prise

But if you are going to do something properly you have to plan ahead or you will end up cutting the moment wrong. Then events will be all wrinkled and puckered.

Well, I don't see any other ones around...

The fact is that 99 out of 100 adults spare themselves the trouble of rational thought 99% of the time (studies have not shown this, I have just invented the statistics so I should not say The fact is, but I would be surprised if the true figures were very different).

The subject of food is like Chopsticks: almost anyone can improvise on it.

He that runs against Time, has an antagonist not subject to casualities.

There are 7 billion people on the planet. Of these, a mere 17 million have the privilege of living in the New York Greater Metropolitan Area.