While The United States is the most powerful nation the world has ever seen, it is also the most detested nation that the world has ever known.

One is and is not in the centre of the maelstrom of it all.

There are some things one remembers even though they may never have happened.

All that happens is that the destruction of human beings - unless they're Americans - is called collateral damage.

The past is what you remember, imagine you remember, convince yourself you remember, or pretend you remember.

Language in art remains a highly ambiguous transaction, a quicksand, a trampoline, a frozen pool which might give way under you ... at any time.

Good writing excites me, and makes life worth living.

I don't think there's been any writer like Samuel Beckett. He's unique. He was a most charming man and I used to send him my plays.

I never think of myself as wise. I think of myself as possessing a critical intelligence which I intend to allow to operate.

Don't forget the earth's about five thousand million years old, at least. Who can afford to live in the past?

This particular nurse said, Cancer cells are those which have forgotten how to die. I was so struck by this statement.

My father had bought him a shirtthat said “Sure you can date my daughter.  In a completely unrelated topic, have you seen my shotgun?

...sin is often the attempt to meet a legitimate need in an illegitimate way.

Love can provide strength when intellect can find no reason for it.

Strength to do battle begins with enlisting the strength of God.

As a teacher I approach my students purely with the human desire to free them from all scholarly inhibitions, and I tell them, "Painters must speak through paint not through words."

Mental violence has no potency and injures only the person whose thoughts are violent. It is otherwise with mental non-violence. It has potency which the world does not yet know.

Let me not follow in the clamor of the world, but walk calmly in my path.

It's surprising how soon you can get used to having money. It's much easier than getting used to not having it.

Poetry, I'm often told, is something made of words. I think it really goes the other way around: words are made of poetry.