When somebody you've known for 20 years, and with whom you have a full context, winks at you or whatever, it can be huge. I think in a sense what you're trying to re-create in fiction is that.

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.

Health and happiness are the two most precious and elusive of human conditions. At their core, they are one and the same. Both are a function of balance.

A rainbow is a storm's masterpiece.

I felt that chess... is a science in the form of a game... I consider myself a scientist. I wanted to be treated like a scientist.

The time you spend alone with God will transform your character and increase your devotion. Then your integrity and godly behavior in an unbelieving world will make others long to know the Lord.

Following the Noble Path is like entering a dark room with a light in the hand; the darkness will all be cleared away, and the room will be filled with light.

To make something look real and alive, nothing can be symmetrical because nothing in real life is symmetrical. You have to make it look organic.

Education, particularly higher education, will take Africa into the mainstream of globalization.

We didn't have a TV because we didn't have a whole lot of money. My parents would have their friends over - their friends who thought, 'How can you live without a TV?

You never advance without losing something en passant... you lose it because you're paying so much attention to the new thing.

Who seeks, and will not take, when once 'tis offer'd, Shall never find it more.