Enlightenment values of individual freedom are manifested best in individual acts of criticism and defiance.

Gandhi saw how people have to re-think their own individuality before engaging in political activity. Otherwise they're just playing the game that the adversary has set out.

In America, you don't even have proper holidays. It's really one of the most prosperous slave societies in history. People work their asses off all year long and get two weeks off! It's incredible.

The people who encouraged me weren't necessarily writers or readers themselves. They were people who were just pleased to see me devote my life to reading and writing.

I found it really disturbing to see a novelist writing a diatribe about Islam and Muslim radical extremists, blurring the distinction between the two.

The idea that human beings can make history, that is something quite unique to the modern West.

We need to infuse politics with ideas like compassion and empathy, and a sense that we live in an interdependent world.

The asymmetries of power that have shaped relations between the West and the rest of the world also exist in the realm of literary criticism.

Most suffering is human-made and avoidable. It's mostly in your head.

Freedom of speech doesn't guarantee great literature.

In the modern world, nationalism remains a very important force. We delude ourselves into thinking that globalization has made all of that redundant and that everyone just wants to be like America.

When you say "I" and "my" too much, you lose the capacity to understand the "we" and "our".

I do not know what is going to happen to us. I am frightened but I feel strong. I have the strength of a woman who has everything to loose.

While the rest of the species is descended from apes, redheads are descended from cats.

It's about doing things that you haven't done before, where you're still kind of a beginner, and not resting on your laurels.

Dodd continued to hope that the murders would so outrage the German public that the regime would fall, but as the days passed he saw no evidence of any such outpouring of anger.

The great paradox is that our lack of faith in love and miracles is what blocks us from receiving love and miracles.

Don't get caught up in other people's expectations. Don't take anything for granted, either.

You can organize elections any day, even tomorrow. But what will be the result of chaotic elections? More chaos!

We are helping the people that [George W.]Bush says are evil. Teheran couldn't be happier about the high oil prices resulting from the Iraq war.

Unless you look like Brad Pitt, it's really hard to have full control of your character.