No-one is going to sit down and read Bleak House to the family any more, but they can all huddle up happily in front of Charles Bronson.

Only in art will the lion lie down with the lamb, and the rose grow without thorn.

Religious belief is without reason and without dignity, and its record is near-universally dreadful.

Probably human cruelty is fixed and eternal. Only styles change.

My life looked good on paper - where, in fact, almost all of it was being lived.

When the past is forgotten, the present is unforgettable

Closure is a greasy little word which, moreover, describes a nonexistent condition. The truth, Venus, is that nobody gets over anything.

Perhaps there are other bits of my life that would take on content, take on shadow, if only I read more and thought less about money.

When you’ve lost all your play, guess what love becomes. Work. Work that gets harder every hour.

Love is blind; but it makes you see the blind man; teetering on the roadside . . .

Every 10 years you're a different person, and the really great books evolve with you as you get older. They're full of new rewards.

The exegetical foundations would appear to be weak, and one shouldn’t build huge theological edifices, no matter how splendid or consistent, on weak foundations.

The definition of a modern approach to war is the acknowledgement of individual lives lost.

I'm a very private, very reclusive kind of guy.

I was never a liberal. I was radical. I was cynical. I was negative. But, I was never a liberal. I always saw that as too lukewarm for me.

Down in the south, it's how we find the brownfield sites without taking too much land take to meet the tremendous demand for housing, and that's what I've done.

The short-story writer knows that he can't proceed cumulatively, that time is not his ally. His only solution is to work vertically, heading up or down in literary space.

If we decide to take this level of business creating ability nationwide, we'll all be plucking chickens for a living.

There is nothing as special as watching greatness.

Katniss....he's still trying to keep you alive.

Eternity to the godly is a day that has no sunset; eternity to the wicked is a night that has no sunrise.