But at a certain point in our lives, we cannot passively allow our upbringing to define us. We must choose it or choose other.

If you believe you will succeed, there is always a chance you might. But if you believe that you will fail, then you will always fail. Never allow yourself to lose before you begin.

Satire is dependent on strong beliefs, and on strong beliefs wounded.

I am a player in life, not an observer. I look at herpes the way you look at a scraped knee.

Until the killing of black men, black mothers' sons, becomes as important to the rest of the country as the killing of a white mother's sons, we who believe in freedom cannot rest until this happens.

But, for instance, when I was awfully young, I read all the Oz books. They were an enormous influence on me.

You guys will write what you want to write, people will say what they want to say. I can't control any of that. All I can control is how I play. I'm trying to be the best player I can be.

Eventually you love people - friends or lovers - because of their flaws.

Catherine went still. Her eyes closed against a sudden wet sting. 'Did you accept her proposal?' Leo nuzzled tenderly into the hollow beneath her ear. 'Of course not, pea-goose.

I love failure. It's stuff that I'm thinking about all the time in my life, so it would make sense to me anyway to write about it.

I try to be respectful of how other people think, I try to listen to what they're saying.

Even on education, his one accomplishment, the Leave No Child Behind Act, and he has left it unfunded.