We read five words on the first page of a really good novel and we begin to forget that we are reading printed words on a page; we begin to see images.

Self pity is easily the most destructive of the non-pharmaceutical narcotics; it is addictive, gives momentary pleasure and separates the victim from reality.

Talking, talking. Spinning a web of words, pale walls of dreams, between myself and all I see.

What art ought to do is tell stories which are moment-by-moment wonderful, which are true to human experience, and which in no way explain human experience.

The citizen can bring our political and governmental institutions back to life, make them responsive and accountable, and keep them honest. No one else can.

Fiction does not spring into the world fully grown, like Athena. It is the process of writing and rewriting that makes a fiction original, if not profound.

Art, of course, is a way of thinking, a way of mining reality.

As a rule of thumb I say, if Socrates, Jesus and Tolstoy wouldn't do it, don't.

When people are serving, life is no longer meaningless.

One of the many interesting challenges nature presents us is its apparent disinterest in maintaining the order humans crave.

One must be just a little crazy to write a great novel. One must be capable of allowing the darkest, most ancient and shrewd parts of one’s being to take over the work from time to time.

If I had to choose a religion, the sun as the universal giver of life would be my god.

The real middle class India that has always been looking for a voice that is its very own. I write about it because I belong to it.

[King René of Anjou (1409-80)] would not listen to the news of his son having lost the Kingdom of Naples, because he would not bedisturbed when painting a picture of a partridge.

On Sanjay and Craig, Ive had a number of chances to work with Chris Hardwick, and that is so much fun.

If an opportunity arises, then I won't use school as an excuse not to work.

My father taught me to be independent and cocky and free thinking, but he could not stand it if I disagreed with him.

I didnt grow up drawing runway models and deciding what they should wear.

It is not a field of a few acres of ground, but a cause, that we are defending, and whether we defeat the enemy in one battle, or by degrees, the consequences will be the same.

Every experience that you go through kinda shapes who you are.

Ingeniously, capitalism discovered that the economy may be moved not by satisfying existing needs, but by creating new ones.