Pithy sentences are like sharp nails which force truth upon our memory.

The first sentence of every novel should be: Trust me this will take time but there is order here very faint very human. Meander if you want to get to town.

If I were asked for a one-sentence sound bite on religion I would say I was against it.

I was told to challenge every spiritual teacher every world leader to utter the one sentence that no religion no political party and no nation on the face of the earth will dare utter: 'Ours is not a better way ours is merely another way.

Censorship is saying: 'I'm the one who says the last sentence. Whatever you say the conclusion is mine.' But the internet is like a tree that is growing. The people will always have the last word - even if someone has a very weak quiet voice. Such power will collapse because of a whisper.

Lapped in poetry wrapped in the picturesque armed with logical sentences and inalienable words.

When I really want to be soothed and reminded of why people bother to fiddle with sentences I often read poetry.

When you translate poetry in particular you're obliged to look at how the writer with whom you're working puts together words sentences phrases the triple tension between the line of verse the syntax and the sentence.

However if a poem can be reduced to a prose sentence there can't be much to it.

Editing is now the easiest thing on earth to do and all the things that evolved out of word processing - 'Oh let's put that sentence there let's get rid of this' - have become commonplace in films and music too.