"The point being, I suppose, that by skirting past the traditional arts (literature, theater, music, painting), one could arrive at a better understanding of the aesthetic impulse in human beings, that the best argument for the importance of art lies precisely in its uselessness, that we are most deeply and powerfully human when we do things for the pure pleasure of doing them—even if it requires untold years of hard work and training and even if the pleasure can entail frightening risk."
—P.A. to J.M.C.