It seems to me that the problem with diaries, and the reason that most of them are so boring, is that every day we vacillate between examining our hangnails and speculating on cosmic order.

People forget years and remember moments.

When I was teaching at Harvard in the 1970s, I went to Project Incorporated in Cambridge and took photography classes. I didn't even know how to aim the camera in those days.

Because I don’t work with an outline, writing a story is like crossing a stream, now I’m on this rock, now I’m on this rock, now I’m on this rock.

Clichés so often befall vain people.

I think almost always that what gets me going with a story is the atmosphere, the visual imagery, and then I people it with characters, not the other way around.

I don't write about things that I have the answers to or things that are very close to home. It just wouldn't be any adventure. It wouldn't have any vitality.

There is some reason, obviously, that you are drawn to your material, but the way in which you explore it might come to be quite different from what you would expect.

Nobody can assume that, to a writer, everything is off-limits.

I like a lot of Margaret Atwood, I like much of Alice Munro. Again, if you were to ask me about male writers, there's often a novel I admire, but not all of their works.

It's often been said that I'm an extremely depressing, cynical writer. I've never known what to make of that.

Before comparing yourself or your life to others, take a good look at your fingers.

God bless them pretty women, I wish they was mine, Their breath is as sweet, The dew on the vine.

Everybody just needs to realize that when you write something you're just in one mood. I was told I needed to write it and it was overdue; I don't even remember what day it was.

I am very bad at drawing. Seriously. I can draw shoes. That's about it.

The great things you intend to do some time must have a beginning if they are ever to be done, so begin something worthwhile today.

The only constant is change. Unless you get a small group of neighbors together to stop it.

What you don't understand, you can make mean anything.

Technology and the pace of change in media is pushing us into an uncomfortable area The media have perhaps become more cavalier towards pushing confidential information.

I don't want to be like the angry old guy in the corner who is always ranting and raving about the same things - but I don't mind doing that just a little bit!

I think a lot of people view the death penalty as a debate class or something. The cost and what's at stake is really, really a big deal.