We say Fine, even though we may be dying, and this is commonly known as taking one's courage in both hands, a phenomenon that has only been observed in the human species.

The world is governed by institutions that are not democratic - the World Bank, the IMF, the WTO.

I think we are blind, Blind but seeing, Blind people who can see, but do not see.

People live with the illusion that we have a democratic system, but it's only the outward form of one. In reality we live in a plutocracy, a government of the rich.

The novel is not so much a literary genre, but a literary space, like a sea that is filled by many rivers.

The U.S. needs to control the Middle East, the gateway to Asia. It already has military installations in Uzbekistan.

Words that come from the heart are never spoken, they get caught in the throat and can only be read in ones's eyes.

A journey never ends. Only the travellers end.

What kind of world is this that can send machines to Mars and does nothing to stop the killing of a human being?

We use words to understand each other and even, sometimes, to find each other.

No human being can achieve all he or she desires in this life except in dreams, so good night all.

The essays in The Great Taos Bank Robbery were my project to win a Master of Arts degree in English when I quit being a newspaper editor and went back to college.

Please leave me something...even one memory would be enough.

The socialist countries have the moral duty of liquidating their tacit complicity with the exploiting countries of the West.

One of the things the BBC does better than anyone is period drama.

So too Plato was, in my view, a very unreliable Platonist. He was too much of a philosopher to think that anything he had said was the last word.

At first I thought I would have to put on an English accent and try a sort of affected Shakespeare thing.

Gathering Blue' was a separate book. I wanted to explore what a society might become after a catastrophic world event. Only at the end did I realize I could make it connect to 'The Giver.

Running away for fear of death, leaving one's dear ones, temples or music to take care of themselves, is irreligion; it is cowardice.

Shift your awareness.

I know why we're here. We're all here because we're not all there.