An artist's job is to be interested in things as they are.

I tend to foster drama via bleakness. If I want the reader to feel sympathy for a character, I cleave the character in half, on his birthday. And then it starts raining. And he's made of sugar.

What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness.

What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness. Those moments when another human being was there, in front of me, suffering, and I responded . . . sensibly. Reservedly. Mildly.

Do those things that incline you toward the big questions, and avoid the things that would reduce you and make you trivial.

Developing our sympathetic compassion is not only possible but the only reason for us to be here on earth.

According to me, your life is going to be a gradual process of becoming kinder and more loving. Hurry up. Speed it along. Start right now.

It's a big world, and I really like it.

Character is that sum total of moments we can't explain.

The generalizing writer is like the passionate drunk, stumbling into your house mumbling: I know I'm not being clear, exactly, but don't you kind of feel what I'm feeling?

Kindness, it turns out, is hard - it starts out all rainbows and puppy dogs, and expands to include . . . well, EVERYTHING.

Risk comes from not knowing what you're doing

A leader who doesn't hesitate before he sends his nation into battle is not fit to be a leader.

I would call the French scumbags, but that, of course, would be a disservice to bags filled with scum. I say we invade Iraq, then invade Chirac.

I have been successful probably because I have always realized that I knew nothing about writing and have merely tried to tell an interesting story entertainingly.

He [Prince] changed the world!!A true visionary.What a loss.I'm devastated.

I give my soul to God, my body to the earth, and my worldly possessions to my nearest of kin, charging them to remember the sufferings of Jesus Christ.

Everyone is isolated from everyone else. The concept of society is like a cushion to protect us from the knowledge of that isolation. A fiction that serves as an anesthetic.

Trying to double talk, get myself in trouble talk.

The idea of Jewish unity, of a plan, an organization, unfortunately exists only in the brains of Hitler and Streicher.

Research indicates that workers have three prime needs: Interesting work, recognition for doing a good job, and being let in on things that are going on in the company.