Jane Austen is at the end of the line that begins with Samuel Richardson, which takes wonder and magic out of the novel, treats not the past but the present.

There are things in American culture that want to wipe the class distinction. Blue jeans. Ready-made clothes. Coca-Cola.

Henry Miller wrote novels, but he calls his protagonist Henry, often Henry Miller, and his books are in this gray area between memoir and novel.

I long for the raised voice, the howl of rage or love.

I think the pattern of my essays is, A funny thing happened to me on my way through Finnegans Wake.

Gertrude Stein really thought of Hemingway as frail. He almost married Stein.

The text is merely one of the contexts of a piece of literature, its lexical or verbal one, no more or less important than the sociological, psychological, historical, anthropological or generic.

Raymond Carver is good. I think he'll be appreciated more and more. He's an easy writer to imitate.

I have, I admit, a low tolerance for detached chronicling and cool analysis.

My assignment is what every writer's assignment is: tell the truth of his own time.

The black situation has changed. They finally realized they're Americans.

And the idea of ourselves is our escape from the fact of what we really are.

Most people believe in God because they have been taught from early infancy to do it, and that is the main reason. Then I think that the next most powerful reason is the wish for safety.

Watching the debate this afternoon it was apparent they loved term limits in the House - as Brutus loved Caesar.

Stop blaming everybody and everything for what's going on. If you really believe that you deserve better, then you would have it.

When we get through with the Jews in America, they'll think the treatment they received in Germany was nothing.

Soft money will find its way and seep into the political system and corrode it, unless we plug every hole.

... I prefer true but imperfect knowledge, even if it leaves much undetermined and unpredictable, to a pretense of exact knowledge that is likely to be false.

Every library answers a twofold need, which is often also a twofold obsession: that of conserving certain objects (books) and that of organizing them in certain ways

There's actually something interesting about having no rehearsal time - you have to just walk in and go with your gut, which is exciting.

When you need a lifestyle change due to [health issues], a dietary change is usually the first thing you need to take control of.