Thomas Harris

When the Fox hears the Rabbit scream he comes a-runnin', but not to help.

I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti.

Nothing made me happen. I happened.

Being smart spoils a lot of things, doesn't it?

She didn't give a damn about some of them, but she had grown to learn that inattention can be a stratagem to avoid pain, and that it is often misread as shallowness and indifference.

I collect church collapses, recreationally. Did you see the recent one in Sicily? Marvelous! The facade fell on sixty-five grandmothers at a special mass. Was that evil? If so, who did it? If he's up there, he just loves it, Officer Starling. Typhoid and swans - it all comes from the same place.

Hello Clarice...

I think it's easy to mistake understanding for empathy - we want empathy so badly. Maybe learning to make that distinction is part of growing up. It's hard and ugly to know somebody can understand you without even liking you.

There is a common emotion we all recognize and have not yet named -- the happy anticipation of being able to feel contempt.