I have found myself writing poetry shortly after I retired. Which I hadn't done in forty years.

Oh, a bookshop. Why not pop in and buy a little Kant? And perhaps just a quarter-pound of Kafka. Don't bother to wrap it, thanks. I'll eat it here.

Good art is a form of prayer. It's a way to say what is not sayable.

Baseball is a game where you are always waiting, and then when something happens it's like turning a kaleidoscope when you were a kid.

I love thrillers. I would even read certain science fiction, although I haven't been a devotee for many years.

There is a lack of context in contemporary education. And contemporary consideration - because we live in those interiorities so much. Especially young kids who live by surfing the Web.

I love baseball. What I love about baseball is that you are always waiting.

The best defense is a good story.

Never use 'submit' as a verb for sending work to magazine or book publishers; say 'offer,' and never, ever submit. Keep your knees unbent. Be brave.

What to know about pain is how little we do to deserve it, how simple it is to give, how hard to lose.

I always had good students.

Regarding war and peace—the seeds of each are planted in the other.

There are so many things that I want so badly to tell you but I just can't.

Deep in my heart politeness impresses me more than competence.

When you have a character to work with, you carry them around in a strange way - they make you look at the world in a different way.

Do your kids a favor: Love your spouse.

When we are foolish, we want to conquer the world. When we are wise, we want to conquer ourselves. That begins when we do what we should no matter how we feel about it.

War mages ordered, threatened and bitched. They didn't deal.

Love is like liquor, the drunker and more impotent you are, the stronger and smarter you think yourself and the surer you are of your rights.

Gandhi: Ninny of the 20th Century.

Oh, I so don't care about the podium at the Oscars. I've stood at the podium at the Oscars and that's close enough. To be a presenter is as close as I need to be.