Chimpanzees are endangered. Severely.

A couple of years I taught in graduate programs at NYU and Columbia, in the early eighties.

If you dedicate your attention to discipline in your life you become smarter while you are writing than while you are hanging out with your pals or in any other line of work.

John Brown first swam into my vision in the 1960s when I was a political activist in the civil rights movement and the anti-war movement at Chapel Hill, where I went to university.

Like Neanderthals, men prefer to hunt alone or, if in a pack, at the head of it. Women, whether in the field or in a campfire, are collaborative, and when they hunt...they work together.

Lists of books we reread and books we can't finish tell more about us than about the relative worth of the books themselves.

Loyalty is weird, it kicks in when you dont expect it and the people who deserve loyalty least seem to get it the most.

For almost anyone who chooses to be a writer, since so very few writers are able to learn a living from their work that is equivalent to the living earned by the average dentist or accountant.

Let the truth take care of itself, I decided. It's done all right on its own so far.

The best thing about writing programs is that it rationalized the apprenticeship of a writer.

Storytelling is an ancient and honorable act. An essential role to play in the community or tribe. It's one that I embrace wholeheartedly and have been fortunate enough to be rewarded for.

Success involves avoiding the lure of making excuses.

Gratitude makes the world a softer, kinder place. It softens that brittle shell of defence. There is always something to be grateful for, no matter how small or simple.

Justice is the armed defense of innocent liberty.

The ugly people aren't accepted so far... but so far I don't the problem is ugly thing... it's because they are zombies... so far you can have and a night with a zombie!

If you play a tune and a person don't tap their feet, don't play the tune.

Those who are overreached by our cunning are far from appearing to us as ridiculous as we appear to ourselves when the cunning of others has overreached us.

The purpose of life is a life with a purpose. So I’d rather die for a cause, than live a life that is worthless.

If you know how to do a job very well, you keep doing it.

There is a much higher probability that a first-class scholar should commit an error than that an author who usually writes nonsense should have one good idea.

My occupation is an open question. I was once an assistant professor of mathematics. Since then, I have spent time living in the woods of Montana.