If we practiced medicine like we practice education, wed look for the liver on the right side and left side in alternate years.

The writer writes in order to teach himself, to understand himself, to satisfy himself; the publishing of his ideas, though it brings gratification, is a curious anticlimax.

One writes to make a home for oneself, on paper, in time, in others' minds.

We never know how much has been missing from our lives until a true writer comes along.

To have a sense of history one must consider oneself a piece of history.

What happens whenever we convert a writer into a symbol is that we lose the writer himself in all his indefeasible singularity, his particular inimitable genius.

A classic is a book that survives the circumstances that made it possible yet alone keeps those circumstances alive.

When a writer talks about his work, he's talking about a love affair.

History has become more important than ever because of the to unprecedented ability of the historical sciences to take in man's life on earth as a whole.

Art changes all the time, but it never "improves." It may go down, or up, but it never improves as technology and medicine improve.

A year after Hemingway died on the front page, Faulkner went off after a binge, as if dying was nobody's business but his own.

I would never put on 20 kilos and mess up my system because a role demands it. Hindi cinema doesn't offer you roles that get you an Oscar, anyway. Tom Hanks can do it in Hollywood; not us.

We are not one people. We are two peoples. We are a people for Freedom and a people for Slavery. Between the two, conflict is inevitable.

Coffee is a language in itself.

A boyfriend has so much to do with a woman blossoming.

When you need a friend most is when no one is cheering.

Spying is a like a game of chess: Sometimes you have to withdraw, sometimes you have to sacrifice one of your pieces to win - preferably a knight rather than a king or queen.

You don't need to have a 100-person company to develop that idea.

In another life - and as I like to say, another body - I used to teach aerobics.

Certainly I have no faith in Jehovah, although I think it quite likely that Jesus Christ, as a preacher and a wise man, did indeed exist.

You can't just have a thought. You have to follow the thought through. But everything starts with the thought.