It were a real increase of human happiness could all young men from the age of nineteen be covered under barrels or rendered otherwise invisible and there left to follow their lawful studies and callings till they emerged sadder and wiser at the age of twenty-five.

Books were my pass to personal freedom. I learned to read at age three and soon discovered there was a whole world to conquer that went beyond our farm in Mississippi.

True terror is to wake up one morning and discover that your high school class is running the country.