Your anatomy is a mystery that nobody bothers explaining to us. Even when we think we have mastered one woman's body, every body is different.

What I've come to learn is that the world is never saved in grand messianic gestures, but in the simple accumulation of gentle, soft, almost invisible acts of compassion.

You know, you can steel your heart against any kind of trouble, any kind of horror. But the simple act of kindness from a complete stranger will unstitch you.

In this time of the Internet and nonfiction, to be on an actual bookshelf in an actual bookstore is exciting in itself.

What we know about who we are comes from stories. It's the agents of our imagination who really shape who we are.

The privilege of being a writer is that you have this opportunity to slow down and to consider things.

People think that writing is writing, but actually writing is editing. Otherwise, you're just taking notes

My friend Ronald Gottesman says...that the cause of all our trouble is the belief in an essential, pure identity: religious, ethnic, historical, ideological.

You can count on Scandinavian literature for a certain kind of darkness, a modern mythic style.

Men do communicate, often very directly, but women sometimes cannot accept how simple what we have to say is. We seldom play games--we aren't that sophisticated.

Before you speak, my friend, remember, a spiritual man contain his anger. Angry words are like slap in de face.

If God had wanted us to judge other people, we'd all have been born with silly wigs.

I've gotten literally thousands of contacts from people across the country - and the most poignant ones being elderly people - who said I had given up on America and I was just waiting to die.

To philosopher and historian the madness and imbecile wickedness of mankind ought to appear ordinary events.

I love coaching. I would probably be coaching. I would work in athletes and work with the youth. I would maybe do personal development and athletics. I would coach in high school or college.

I would be a terrible person to be in a relationship with because I'm either sleeping or at the theater.

The devil could change. He was once an angel and may be evolving still.

To ask for power is forcing uphill a stone which after all rolls back again from the summit and seeks in headlong haste the levels of the plain.

Because I dislike being quoted I lie almost constantly when talking about my work.

The police belongs to the people and the people belong to the police.

Books wind into the heart.