I tell myself that, regardless of what source I draw on, I'm writing a new work for reasons peculiar to me and not an adaptation, and so feel, in the end, justified in singing it my way.

A first-person voice helps to ensure the uniformity and cohesiveness of the narrative; it gathers unto itself incidents and characters in its unstoppable progress toward the story's end.

I don't know about ground rules; but I create the world that arrives with the characters or situation or voice in my head that instigates the piece, whatever form it may take.

My fondness for extended monologue might have been encouraged by two decades of writing stage and radio dramas.

Eventually, I came to believe, stupidly, that I had exhausted that story's "original" form with its single use. I went on to other stories, other forms and genres.

I admitted that I did not understand life. What I meant was that I am bewildered by human hearts and motivations, including my own.

I very much like the idea of the unreliable narrator. Shaping my fictions as monologues - by introducing the "I" - allows me to be as unreliable as I like.

For me, fiction's great gift - to writer and reader, alike - is freedom.

I'm too ambitious to give another man credit, even if that other man is only myself in disguise.

When I was awarded a fellowship in poetry by the National Endowment for the Arts (for "Alphabets"), I felt myself suddenly (vaingloriously) equal to my Crow, which would be - I knew at once - Rat.

I do seem to favor a deathbed confession as the occasion for my dramatic monologues.

It's okay to wander.

I can't speak anymore, I open my mouth but nothing comes out. So many things to say. I wonder if you really want to hear it anyway?Instead, I leave my heavy mind exploding with unfinished thoughts.

Sharing food with another human being is an intimate act that should not be indulged in lightly.

Low class men desire wealth;middle class men both wealth and respect; but the noble, honour only; hence honour is the noble man's true wealth.

No sound ought to be heard in the church but the healing voice of Christian charity.

In the Far East, studying yoga is comparable to a mixture of attending one of the best Western universities, and of being an intrepid explorer.

Donald Trump is finding out what I found out: when you run for office, you are not allowed to tell a joke.

The Bible carries with it the history of the creation, the fall and redemption of man, and discloses to him, in the infant born at Bethlehem, the Legislator and Savior of the world.

When you ask people, 'What's the opposite of fragile?,' they tend to say robust, resilient, adaptable, solid, strong. That's not it. The opposite of fragile is something that gains from disorder.

Meditation is one of the ways in which the spiritual man keeps himself awake.