Jonathan Lethem

"“Where did you come from?” asked Omidon. “I was exiled to the margin,” said Wendy sourly. “For what reason?” “Why is anyone ever exiled to the margin? For threatening the center.”"

"Feeling unique is what we all have in common, it’s the thing that’s always the same."

"Human lives exist to be experienced, or possibly endured, but not solved. They resemble any other novel more than they do mysteries. Westerns, even. It’s that lie the mystery tells that I detest."

"“Scout, that’s a good one,” said the sergeant. “Danny-boy couldn’t scout the inside of his eyelids.”"

"“Don’t try to figure me out,” I said. “It doesn’t work—I’ve tried it myself.”"

"The way to make a bundle in architecture right now was to devise new ways for people to pretend to gather while actually keeping their distance."

"You remind me of myself, once upon a time. We’re not really that different even now. We chafe at our bits—but you’re stubborn, inflexible. Stupid, finally. I’ve learned to compromise. In negotiation lies power, viability. Your inflexibility has rendered you marginal."

"You consider yourself an outsider, a seeker of truth amidst lies, yet you’ve bought into the biggest lie that can be told. You snort it through your nose and let it run in your bloodstream."

"Architectural offices are always a good argument against architects, and Copperminer and Bayzwaite was no exception. The outer room served just about any purpose imaginable except those of walking in, talking to the receptionist, and sitting down to wait. I enacted these procedures anyhow, only I skipped sitting after taking a look at what passed for chairs. The room had been shaped from molten glass, pierced through with beams of burnished aluminum, and although several of these met in a confluence meant to suggest a seat, it didn’t look like something I’d be able to get back out of, so I let it pass."

"He was a wretched excuse for a human being, but for an inquisitor he wasn’t half bad."

"I’d joined the ever-growing category of things that look better when you leave the light off."

"It was that rarity, an easy decision."

"He allowed himself to feel that his stubbornness was courage. Maybe it was."

"He’s just a classic scapegoat, told people things they didn’t want to hear. There’s never any percentage in being ahead of your time."

"Everett realized what was wrong with the scene. L.A. was built for cars, and without them it was bereft, a body drained of blood. Or a hive itself, only emptied. A husk."

"What better way to keep people under your thumb? Make up some big enemy, justify everything as part of the war effort."

"Give it up, Chaos. Sane and real only go so far these days."

"“That’s the way it has to be for you. You’ll always be living in an FSR.” “FSR?” “Finite Subjective Reality. That’s what I call it. I ought to copyright that, in fact. You go creating a little area of control around you, until you bump into the next guy with his. A little sphere of reality and unreality, sanity and insanity, whatever you pull together. There’s no hope of sorting it out. That’s the way you live. FSR.”"

"Journeyman himself had a kind of tone deafness when it came to Eastern stuff, or at least to the Eastern stuff spouted by Westerners who fancied themselves enlightened."

"This was before cell phones. The desolate spaciousness between humans, between human moments, not yet filled in with chattering ghosts of reassurance. You could hear yourself not think."

"“OK, so he’s a producer, right?” Lucius spoke as a prosecuting attorney, nailing down established facts. “The thing about producers is that they are producing something, usually several things at once.” “He’s a liar,” said Jane. “Same thing,” said Lucius."

"Things changed, he thought. Then they didn’t. And we forgot they could again."

"People believe what they need to believe."