For me, things were either very sullied or very pure, very controlled or very under-controlled.

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.

The bright sun was extinguish'd, and the starsDid wander darkling in the eternal space.

I want to make music. That means I prefer the Steinway piano.

Before undergoing a surgical operation, arrange your temporal affairs. You may live.

It's a strange lesson to learn in life that your differences, the things that make you feel uncomfortable about yourself are what will help you to grow into who you are. Those are your gifts.

A neurosis defends itself by coming up with rationalizations to explain away bizarre behavior.

When you're six years old, you don't look at things the way an adult looks at things.

I just think you people would be happier back in Africa where you came from.

The idea of old was to conform yourself to a style of cooking, it was not to create a style of cooking. Now the chef is so much into 'I want to sign that dish and say I am the one who made that dish.

I blessed the power which has filled my life with poetry.

I didn't really decide that I wanted to be an astronaut for sure until the end of college.