A novel is a piece of architecture. It's not random wallowings or confessional diaries. It's a building-it has to have walls and floors and the bathrooms have to work.

Goodnight you princes of Maine, you kings of New England.

If you are lucky enough to find a way of life you love, you have to find the courage to live it.

Never confuse faith, or belief — of any kind — with something even remotely intellectual.

Keep passing the open windows.

Half my life is an act of revision.

You only grow by coming to the end of something and by beginning something else.

I have pretty thick skin, and I think if you're going to be in this business, if you're going to be an actor or a writer, you better have a thick skin.

It is hard work and great art to make life not so serious.

If you don't feel that you are possibly on the edge of humiliating yourself, of losing control of the whole thing, then probably what you are doing isn't very vital.

. . .There are moments when time does stop. We must be alert enough to notice such moments . . .

The purpose of the Sisterhood of Librarians is to keep the secret of creative juice and keep the idea of libraries alive.

Today’s youngsters will unfortunately never know the thrills we experienced dubbing movies in the era of Rashomon.

One who in a perilous emergency thinks with his legs.

The firmest friendships have been formed in mutual adversity as iron is most strongly united by the fiercest flame.

A request not to worry ... is perhaps the least soothing message capable of human utterance.

People in the age of [President] Obama don't dress like they did in the age of [Lyndon] Johnson. That's for sure.

Religion is indeed woman's panoply; no one who wishes her happiness would divest her of it; no one who appreciates her virtues would weaken her best security.

I try to be as ignorant about things as I can.

Be it life or death, we crave only reality.

I love aging. Why would I want to be 21 for the rest of my life?