I never wanted to be rich or successful or famous. I just wanted to be happy and have fun.

I just go to lunch. And I never know when something is going into the file and something is not.

I have always had a particular antagonism for the military.

I never know what's going to happen in a novel. I don't have a plan or an outline.

And off in the far distance, the gold on the wings of the angel atop the bell tower of San Marco flashed in the sun, bathing the entire city in its glistening benediction.

Venetians feel affection and loyalty to their city, rather than to the Italian state.

This is a fallen world. People lie, the truth gets distorted, and that's the way it is. What's for dinner ?

All through graduate school, instead of having a television I read murder mysteries: Hammett, Chandler, Ruth Rendell, P. D. James.

Oh, so seldom does fate cast our enemy into our hands, to do with as we will

And I don't want to live anywhere where I am famous. It makes me very, very uncomfortable, because it conveys an advantage over people, and I don't like that.

So much of contemporary crime fiction is painful to read and obsessed with violence, particularly against women, and I can't read that.

May God continue to give you much more grace for every great deed.

I don't think it's that difficult to administer. I'm sure a sensible solution can be found.

I've lived history. I've made history, and I know I'll have my place in history. That's not egoism.

Success is always less funny than failure.

I went with an exorcist for a bit. I just want to know really practical things, like how do you hold someone possessed by the devil.

If you don't feel good in it, don't wear it. Because it'll never look good. Any hesitation in the fitting room and just walk away

Everybody's got a habit.

You're exhausted in the faith because you're looking at you. The more you look at yourself and the less you look at God, the more you get frustrated at yourself.

What we call soul has been around a long time. It comes out of a particular culture that is African in origin, but influenced by 250 years of slavery, as well as other forms of racial oppression.

There's nothing wrong with delighting in what you do. In fact, most of the fun you'll have as a poet will come about during the process of writing.