In their effort to divorce language and experience, deconstructionist critics remind me of middle-class parents who do not allow their children to play in the street.

One writes because one has been touched by the yearning for and the despair of ever touching the Other.

The ambition of much of today's literary theory seems to be to find ways to read literature without imagination.

A true confession: I believe in a soluble fish.

Finishing a book is just like you took a child out in the back yard and shot it.

I think men don't know what they want, so the idea of not knowing what they're getting makes it a little easier on them.

I don't have anything to say in any picture.

I can't imagine my life without animals. I have two dogs and three cats. Coming home and finding them all lined up at the door waiting for me has got to be one of the sweetest joys of my life.

Everything goes. I am working very hard at not thinking about how everything goes.

How often, in this cold and bitter world, is the warm heart thrown back upon itself! Cold, careless, are we of another's grief; we wrap ourselves in sullen selfishness.

The rights of copyright holders need to be protected, but some draconian remedies that have been suggested would create more problems than they would solve.

A wise man speaks because he has something to say; a fool because he has to say something.

If you care about the slaughter of the innocent, then for God's sake, speak up.

You cannot lecture on really pure poetry any more than you can talk about the ingredients of pure water-it is adulterated, methylated, sanded poetry that makes the best lectures.