I'm such a baby if I even get a flu.

I tend to foster drama via bleakness. If I want the reader to feel sympathy for a character, I cleave the character in half, on his birthday. And then it starts raining. And he's made of sugar.

What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness.

What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness. Those moments when another human being was there, in front of me, suffering, and I responded . . . sensibly. Reservedly. Mildly.

Do those things that incline you toward the big questions, and avoid the things that would reduce you and make you trivial.

Developing our sympathetic compassion is not only possible but the only reason for us to be here on earth.

According to me, your life is going to be a gradual process of becoming kinder and more loving. Hurry up. Speed it along. Start right now.

It's a big world, and I really like it.

Character is that sum total of moments we can't explain.

The generalizing writer is like the passionate drunk, stumbling into your house mumbling: I know I'm not being clear, exactly, but don't you kind of feel what I'm feeling?

Kindness, it turns out, is hard - it starts out all rainbows and puppy dogs, and expands to include . . . well, EVERYTHING.

Money like a queen gives rank and beauty .

I love creating individual short stories within chapters, but I want to get better at building consistent narratives from start to finish.

Had I been blessed with even limited access to my own mind there would have been no reason to write.

I grew up with art from the innocent age of ten - with art, but with no sense of identity.

Man works for an object. Remove that object and you reduce him into inaction.

Isn't it funny? You hear a phone ring and it could be anybody. But, a ringing phone has to be answered doesn't it?

As you shift and change your own experience, the experience of the whole human race begins to shift and change as well. So this is important work you are doing, this business of changing your life.

We no longer want to be a province that is unlike the others, we want to be a country [that will be] like the others.

I just wanted a change. My hair started hurting my back, so I went to my hairdresser and said 'Take it off.' And I'm delighted with the results.

Sorrow and solitude, these are the precious things/ And the only words that are worth remembering.