I hope for what I always hope for as a writer: a critical but kind reader. I think that is what we all hope for.

Homesickness hits hardest in the middle of a crowd in a large, alien city.

Everything is fair in love and art.

He imagined forgiveness was like flying, that it made you soar. He imagined that it looked like an eagle, a silver bolt in the sky, that it was pure light.

Contemporary writers annoyed him, he found their worlds insular, their style too self-conscious and ironic. Theirs was not a literature that belonged to him.

I swooned again – I had that moment of falling in love with reading again.

It is gaol that finally reveals to me the beauty of Shakespeare, the spirit in his words, the jaw-dropping audacity of his language.

Today’s happiness depends on yesterday’s choice, just as today’s choice will determine tomorrow’s happiness.

Since truth is often stranger than fiction, fiction needs to be pretty weird.

Growing older does not seem to make you more certain. It simply presents you with more reasons for doubt.

Life should imitate romance literature far more often.

If I can make an impact, I want to help some kids and bridge the gap between soccer and celebrity in America.

We can tell our values by looking at our checkbook stubs.

You can't fall in love after 40; you know so much about life that you can't get fooled anymore.

Each part of a great painting should in itself be a great painting.

I try to treat people as people and not put them in pigeonholes.

Many people love my music. Many do not understand it. In general my music is more easily understood by younger people in Mali, and by people outside Africa.