The absence of teeth in VN’s Pnin:

“It surprised him to realize how fond he had been of his teeth. His tongue, a fat sleek seal, used to flop and slide so happily among the familiar rocks, checking the contours of a battered but still secure kingdom, plunging from cave to cove, climbing this jag, nuzzling that notch, finding a shred of sweet seaweed in the same old cleft; but now not a landmark remained, and all there existed was a great dark wound, a terra incognita of gums which dread and disgust forbade one to investigate. And when the plates were thrust in, it was like a poor fossil being fitted with the grinning jaws of a perfect stranger.”

Fairfield Porter on painter John Marin:

“The largeness of his vision has something shy about it, a holding off; he does not touch things closely. The imprecision is only imprecision.”

—John Marin, Mt. Chocorua No. 1