In recompense, envy may be the subtlest - perhaps I should say the most insidious - of the seven deadly sins.

- Joseph Epstein

I was recently asked what it takes to become a writer. Three things, I answered: first, one must cultivate incompetence at almost every other form of…

- Joseph Epstein

I just know so many people who have six or seven foreign languages and have read everything and have musical training and they are still dorks

- Joseph Epstein

We use books like mirrors, gazing into them only to discover ourselves.

- Joseph Epstein

Culture means, I think, that you have widened your experience enough through reading and through being a little bit thoughtful about these things tha…

- Joseph Epstein

What distinguishes us one from another is our dreams, and what we do to make them come about.

- Joseph Epstein

Not to like ice cream is to show oneself uninterested in food.

- Joseph Epstein

A cat is the only domestic animal I know who toilet trains itself and does a damned impressive job of it.

- Joseph Epstein

Political correctness and so many of the political fashions of the day...could only be perpetrated in adolescent minds: minds, that is, that are trai…

- Joseph Epstein