“If you don’t write the book you have to write, everything breaks.”

People should pay more attention. Everyone wants attention, but no one wants to give attention.

I am very interested in loyalty, even if the person to whom one is loyal is flawed, criminal, or otherwise in the wrong.

I liked the fact she understood how we all have little secret habits that seem normal enough to us, but which we know better than to mention out loud.

It annoys the hell out of me when people say, This is the kitchen, and this is the bathroom. What am I, Helen Keller? I mean, it’s pretty obvious when you’re in a kitchen and when you’re not.

It’s my policy not to review funerals.

Sometimes you can do things for others that you can’t do for yourself.

A lot of people get flipped out if you’re quiet. They say stuff like, What are you thinking? And if they don’t start interrogating you, they start talking, going on and on about stuff that’s totally irrelevant, and the silence gets so big and loud that it’s scary.

Books tell you more about their owners than the owners do.

The world of Shirley Jackson is eerie and unforgettable.

You really can’t write well if you’re thinking about what the reviewers might say.

I’m very interested in compassion – compassion for oneself and others. I write about very complicated characters and experiences and try to do it without judging the character or the action.

I’m nothing you can catch now. I am black powder, I am singe, I am the bomb that bursts the night.

I’d say our ability to supersize emotions are American-made special effects. In European countries, people mostly stay close to home and whatever rage there is simmers under the surface – it’s what made the plays of Shakespeare and Harold Pinter so good.

Was this the big one or was this the small tremor, the warning? Does it get better – does the sensation of being in a dream underwater go away?

Everything is phenomenal; everything is incredible; never treat life casually. To be spiritual is to be amazed.

Awe is a sense for transcendence, for the reference everywhere to mystery beyond all things. It enables us to perceive in the world intimations of the divine.

My business is to enjoy and have fun. And why not, if in the end everything will end, right?

If I had one day when I didn’t have to be all confused and didn’t have to feel that I was ashamed of everything. If I felt that I belonged someplace. You know?

He must be superhuman in his efforts to store away in the core of his subconscious everything that he might be called upon to use in the expression of his art.

When everything is together – the band, me, the audience, it’s boss! It’s just like magic.

If you’re not afraid, if you take everything you are, everything worthwhile in you and direct it at one goal, one ultimate mark, you’ve got to get there.

Maybe primitive people have less bullshit to let go of, to give up.