I don't have a disregard for my reader in humor pieces.

Siberia is so big, it’s almost more an idea than a place

When the days start to get shorter, I want to be in some nice brick building on the East Coast with the lights glowing in the windows. When the daylight starts changing, I want to be out West.

Every once in a while, people need to be in the presence of things that are really far away.

People in Russia adapt to misery by a deep, deep humor.

There's an idea of the Plains as the middle of nowhere, something to be contemptuous of. But it's really a heroic place.

Everything in Russia is made of cement - phone booths, fence posts and light bulbs.

Sometimes travel is merely an opportunity taken when you can.

Russian humor is to adapt or make some sense or nonsense out of the insanity of their lives.

I think what is important for things to be funny is if you the listener, or the reader, get a chance to supply the humor of it yourself.

Words are charms. It's like a song you didn't even know you knew.

For time and the world do not stand still. Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or the present are certain to miss the future.

Influence is the key word in any definition of leadership.

Those who are serious in ridiculous matters will be ridiculous in serious matters.

There are few people who are more often in the wrong than those who cannot endure to be so.

Some of our weaknesses are born in us, others are the result of education; it is a question which of the two gives us most trouble.

It's difficult for me to diet, so I don't. So, I make up for it in exercise. What I am willing to eat, I have to be willing to work off. It's that simple.

I'm pretty, but not beautiful. I sin, but I'm not the devil. I'm good, but I'm not an angel.

Philosophy will not be able to effect an immediate transformation of the present condition of the world. This is not only true of philosophy, but of all merely human thought and endeavor.

Only mediocrities progress. An artist revolves in a cycle of masterpieces, the first of which is no less perfect than the last.

I know more than I can express in words, and the little I can express would not have been expressed, had I not known more.