Pico Iyer

"Contractions, 'U' for 'you' and the like are wonderful to make communication brief and efficient - but we wouldn't want all our talk to be only brief and efficient. Taking pauses out of language would be like taking the net away from a tennis game. Where would all the fun go?"

"I've never meditated in my life. I don't practice yoga nor any religion. I'm a tourist on the realm of stillness."

"If we do away with semi-colons, parentheses and much else, we will lose all music, nuance and subtlety in communication - and end up shouting at one another in block capitals."

"My Christmas present to myself each year is to see how much air travel can open up the world and take me to places as far from sheltered California and Japan as possible."