A master of tone and texture and an authority on the bizarre, Karen Russell writes with great flair and fearlessness.

Love is the best wisdom.

Help me Cassius or I sink!

So how can a poet-an intelligent, serious poet-write mystical verse now? The poetry of Adam Zagajewski provides the beginning of an answer to this question.

If I'd thought, "I can't really play this instrument," I wouldn't have done it! But I didn't care, you know. I didn't care!

Strangely enough I'm better on a stage. I love that I feel like I blossom in front of a whole bunch of people.

The true test of civilization is not the census, nor the size of cities, nor the crops - no, but the kind of man the country turns out.

Isn't it just heart-stopping and mind-numbing when you stop and realize that the Republican Party doesn't want to win?

Teasing out the way the world might look through another's eyes is what makes the creative process so fascinating and enjoyable.

Which came first - the observer or the particle?