“Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you fall into an open sewer and die.”

The brilliance of Max Brooks is that he always quotes authorities at the back of his books that never existed. Like a Russian professor he made up that validates a story or character.

He who hesitates is poor.

Immortality is a by-product of good work.

As far as songwriters, I’ve always been a fan of Irving Berlin, Cole Porter, and George Gershwin; those guys mean a lot to me.

There’s an army story in me, and I think there’s a WWII Brooks film somewhere.

I know how to make it a great musical. I’ve got to. It’s like I’ve got to see it on stage.

I like Chris Rock. He’s dangerous.

Well, just being stupid and politically incorrect doesn’t work. You can be politically incorrect if you’re smart.

Bad taste is simply saying the truth before it should be said.

If you’re quiet, you’re not living. You’ve got to be noisy and colorful and lively.

Every human being has hundreds of separate people living under his skin.

Everything we do in life is based on fear, especially love.

I was a soldier in WWII. The last couple of months of the war I was actually in combat.

Anybody can direct, but there are only eleven good writers.

I don’t have a mission. I don’t have a torch to burn.

Everything starts with writing. And then to support your vision, your ideas, your philosophy, your jokes, whatever, you’ve gotta perform them and/or direct them, or sometimes just produce them.

You [Chopin] have in your fingers an orchestra of butterflies.

I place my fingers upon these keys typing 2,000 dreams per minute and naked of spirit dance forth my cosmic vortex upon this crucifix called language.

Stars ink your fingers with a lexicon of flame blazing rare knowledge.

Today I am in control because I want to be. I have my fingers on the switch, but have lived a lifetime ignoring the control I have over my own world. Today is different.

Fools always blame the fire when they burn their fingers.

You’re a work of art only just framed by my eager fingertips.

Your love tickles down my thighs. Let me take it with my fingers and put it on my mouth. Let me see how you taste.

I know how our fingers would interlace. Like this and that. Delicate yet determined. As porcelain scales in serene movements. Iridescent in ways our thoughts could not convey. How beautifully we are made in the ways we trace out along soft skins the words that linger within us.