If you don't burn the candle at both ends, what's the candle got two ends for?

In my day, we didn't have self-esteem, we had self-respect, and no more of it than we had earned.

You've either got to find a way to make your continuing characters interesting without making them maudlin or overwrought, or you've got to put more emphasis on the suspects.

Everybody is a True Believer. Everybody has a little nugget they're convinced of that is the opposite of the nugget on the other side. And they're convinced it's fact.

Knowledge pursued for its own sake - that's the definition of education, as opposed to training.

I was the executive editor on a little magazine called Greek Accent, whose only claim to fame is that its art director went on to be the art director of Discover for many years.

Nobody in real life ever takes me seriously.

I don't make my own schedule - it's constructed around my sons' school schedules.

Listen to advice. You don't know how many writer's conferences I've taught at where at least half the audience fights all the conventions of the field.

I've been a teacher at the college level, in composition mostly, and I've been an editor on magazines.

People always seemed to know half of history, and to get it confused with the other half.

GRAPESHOT, n. An argument which the future is preparing in answer to the demands of American Socialism.

Often we fail to consider the fact that our social, spiritual, and intellectual interests are miles apart. Our value systems and goals are contradictory, but we are in love.

Like everything else in life, these questions have no easy answers.

Being out in the heat for two weeks can definitely drain your energy.

We act like a zero-sum society, when in reality there is a lot of non zero-sum fat to be skimmed off to everyone's mutual advantage.

I don't know if I could, like, see a face and know what the face of beauty looks like, but after I've seen it I know if I've felt like it was beauty.

The musical mystery is: How do you marry tuned percussion and voice? On a metaphorical level, everything that's really important - like the clouds, the sky and the earth - is a giant mystery.

It was hard to reassure grown-ups when you weren't certain yourself what you were feeling and thinking—when thoughts dissolved before you could name them.

Talent is a universal gift, but it takes a lot of courage to use it. Don't be afraid to be the best.

Loving a baby is a circular business, a kind of feedback loop. The more you give the more you get and the more you get the more you feel like giving.