Marriage is like democracy - it doesn't really work, but it's all we've been able to come up with.

It's nervous work. The state you need to write in is the state that others are paying large sums of money to get rid of.

Poetry has been the longest pleasure of my life.

The tragedy is not that love doesn't last. The tragedy is the love that lasts.

Americans' great and secret fear is that America may turn out to be a phenomenon rather than a civilization.

There is balance in life, but not fairness.

It is the impulse of our century, with its nearly religious belief in magnitude, to fling an institution into every void.

I think that one is constantly startled by the things that appear before you on the page when you're writing.

Sometimes, surely, truth is closer to imagination or to intelligence, to love than to fact? To be accurate is not to be right.

In thoughts one keeps a reserve of hope, in spite of everything. You cannot say good-bye in imagination. That is something you can only do in actuality.

Human beings need unhappiness at least as much as they need happiness.

Instead of getting hard ourselves and trying to compete women should try to give their best qualities to men- bring them softness teach them how to cry.

O sleep O gentle sleep Nature's soft nurse.

Anthropology demands the open-mindedness with which one must look and listen, record in astonishment and wonder that which one would not have been able to guess.

If you look at the best-seller list for American fiction, they're all sequels to detective stories or stories about hunting serial killers. That's what's called American fiction these days.

I always think it's interesting to dig a little bit deeper every time you go to someplace that seems like a revelation or a strong connection to an emotional truth.

Pity is always twinged with disgust.

Chemotherapy isn't easy. I felt very fortunate I wouldn't have to go through that.

People who are making films today are too concerned with mechanics - technical things instead of feeling.

Anyone who's lived with companion cats or dogs knows that they are unique individuals with their own personalities. I think animals' secret to getting along is that they are not burdened by an ego.

It's crazy to say that after three games [without a goal] I was in crisis. I do not care whether I score or not, what matters is that the team win and continue to do so.