It isn’t that he didn’t like people; it’s just that he preferred them dead. The dead can’t hurt you. So Daniel spent his time in the library reading, listening to the wise and learned from better ages. They led him to better worlds. Worlds where adventures happened and always turned out well in the end; worlds where men were good and women loved them for their goodness. Worlds where good and evil were clear. Daniel went to the land of other men’s imaginations as often as he could. It was safer there.
Locusts and Wild Honey 
It’s so important to get clear ideals when we’re young. Because we won’t see much of them in the real world, once we get away from the books. But, nevertheless, these “fairytales” are shadows of the highest end, and we must not get so adultish that we stop believing in them.