It's the writer's job to stage confrontations, so the characters will say surprising and revealing things, and educate and entertain us all.

True terror is to wake up one morning and discover that your high school class is running the country.

We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful what we pretend to be.

There is a tragic flaw in our precious constitution, and I don't know what can be done to fix it. This is it: Only nut cases want to be president.

I want to stand as close to the edge as I can without going over. Out on the edge you see all the kinds of things you can't see from the center.

He didn't look like a soldier at all. He looked like a filthy flamingo.

Any reviewer who expresses rage and loathing for a novel is preposterous. He or she is like a person who has put on full armor and attacked a hot fudge sundae.

Perhaps I am the turtle, able to live simply anywhere, even underwater for short periods, with my home on my back.

About astrology and palmistry: they are good because they make people vivid and full of possibilities. They are communism at its best. Everybody has a birthday and almost everybody has a palm.

We are here on Earth to fart around. Don't let anybody tell you any different.

Enjoy your body, use it every way you can. Don’t be afraid of it, or what other people think of it, it’s the greatest instrument you’ll ever own.

To bind one free man with love is better than to release a thousand slaves.

Some artists are normal people who just happen to make things because we can't figure out how in the hell to communicate with people.

Love what you do!

It is far better to be alone, than to be in bad company.

Some people who look at abstract art say 'I could do that.' A good response is, 'Go ahead but then you'll be accused of copying.

Worrying makes you cross the bridge before you come to it.

I'm so busy writing and editing two books a year that I don't have time for painting anymore.

You have, you can only answer it this way: by turning it around. Can the negro - who is the victim of the system - escape the collective stigma that is placed upon all Negroes in this country?

I always said, 'A blind dog with three legs could get a standing ovation for singing 'I'm Still Here!''

Unions don't create jobs. People create jobs.