I'm persona non grata at the New Yorker.

When one person mentors, two lives are changed.

[Calvin Trilllin] is not writing about things that I can criticize. I can call these other people out for what I think they are not doing. There's a big difference.

When I graduated [from Yale], I went back to Larry [Kramer]. But when I go to Yale reunions, there are still people who call me David.

Calvin [Trillin] was much more of a mover and a shaker. That's all I'm saying. I was a "weenie." That was another term back then.

That's why I tried to kill myself when I was a student [in Yale]. I thought I was the only one there.

I'm sorry to keep focusing on the New Yorker, but everybody who was growing up when Calvin [Trillin] and I were growing up wanted to be published in the New Yorker.

I talked to [Larry] Kramer a little bit about it while I was writing 'Remembering Denny' . Denny was one of those people who took a long time to come out.

"Shoe" just meant you were a big jock on campus no matter what field you were in.

[Calvin Trillin] was very "shoe," which means he was a big jock, a big deal.

One thing I learned in sobriety is to stop being judgmental, to always be discerning. When I drive, that will be my bumper sticker.

The middle class is collapsing and we are moving toward an oligarchic form of society, where the billionaires will control the economy and the political life of the country.

Even in today's opera world, the position of the black tenor is problematic.

I can't change history, I don't want to change history. I can only change the future. I'm working on that.

Connecting is the ability to identify with people and relate to them in a way that increases your influence with them.

Hopes and regrets are the sweetest links of existence.

Good schools, good jobs, good government. These are not unreasonable demands. But sadly, some of our people have already lost heart and have left Hawaii to look for these things elsewhere.

forgetting things is what gives old age a bad name, that and old age.

Any foundation you build, if trust is part of that foundation, whatever you're building, whatever you're creating is gonna have a rock-solid foundation.

Zen is to have the heart and soul of a little child.

The simple fact was that if the song wasn't about me, I couldn't see how it could possibly be about anybody else, including the one I knew it was supposed to be about, and good luck to him, too.