“Quotations are signposts, a part of my sentimental education, part of the way I breathe in the world,” says Paul Holdengräber. “I need those words of others in order to think, to be.” As the host of the podcast Quotomania, a project from Onassis Los Angeles (OLA)—at which Holdengräber serves as founding executive director—and the nonprofit radio station Dublab, Holdengräber shares some of his favorite words from leading minds across history. Far from a random mash-up of pithy statements, the show, launched this past fall, is a treasure trove of incisive and moving thoughts, selected by one of the most passionate self-professed quotomaniacs of our time. The featured lines offer listeners insight into how their originators understood the world—and how Holdengräber does, too. “I believe with Michel de Montaigne that ‘I only quote others to better express myself,’” he writes in the podcast’s description.