There's something about rushing water that I can watch for hours and feel as if I need to do nothing more. It's alive in a way that's greater than an…

- Mark Helprin

Perhaps passing through the gates of death is like passing quietly through the gate in a pasture fence. On the other side, you keep walking, without …

- Mark Helprin

They gave themselves up to the stars the way swimmers can surrender to the waves, and the stars took them without resistance.

- Mark Helprin

In daily life language is important, if not in itself, then as a symptom.

- Mark Helprin

Words were all he knew; they possessed and overwhelmed him, as if they were a thousand white cats with whom he shared a one-room apartment.

- Mark Helprin

And if you were a spirit, and time did not bind you, and patience and love were all you knew, then there you would wait for someone to return, and th…

- Mark Helprin

The shelf was filled with books that were hard to read, that could devastate and remake one's soul, and that, when they were finished, had a kick lik…

- Mark Helprin

As long as you have life and breath, believe. Believe for those who cannot. Believe even if you have stopped believing. Believe for the sake of the d…

- Mark Helprin

To see the beauty of the world is to put your hands on lines that run uninterrupted through life and through death. Touching them is an act of hope, …

- Mark Helprin