Perhaps the apparent favor of the universe is no more than the crocodile grin of a Doberman breathing hard and about to be hungry?

So plant your own gardens and decorate your own soul, instead of waiting for someone to bring you flowers.

Being with you and not being with you is the only way I have to measure time.

Don't talk unless you can improve the silence.

I am not sure that I exist, actually. I am all the writers that I have read, all the people that I have met, all the women that I have loved; all the cities I have visited.

I cannot sleep unless I am surrounded by books.

The worst labyrinth is not that intricate form that can entrap us forever, but a single and precise straight line

The fact is that poetry is not the books in the library . . . Poetry is the encounter of the reader with the book, the discovery of the book.

Nothing is built on stone; all is built on sand, but we must build as if the sand were stone.

I can give you my loneliness, my darkness, the hunger of my heart, I am trying to bribe you with uncertainty, with danger, with defeat.

The original is unfaithful to the translation.

What is different is not necessarily dangerous, and what is similar is not always secure.

I've published one book before, and now I'm writing a book of essays and stories about life in Tokyo. And I have one book coming out in May in Germany, about fitness.

As the Arabs say, "The nature of rain is the same, but it makes thorns grow in the marshes and flowers in the gardens.

I see more people all the time feeling something growing from within them to more fully realize their heart's desire, their desire to give more, to be more, to do more.

As a kid I wanted to write science fiction, and I was never without a book. Later I really got into being a scientist and never thought I'd be writing novels.

Experience is a valuable thing. It enables us to recognize mistakes when we repeat them.

If American Idol was the Olympics, I'd still get a medal. It was a great race.

In The Interestings I wanted to write about what happens to talent over time. In some people talent blooms, in others it falls away.

The world is made up of Stories, not Atoms.

Simplicate, and add lightness!