People who are sick, or who have been sick, or have come close to death have a lot to say - and they want you to hear it.

Then everyone leaves, and you are left, each night, to your own devices with a crowd of interesting people - most of whom you don't know - sitting in the dark.

Some people study a text very deeply. The people are my text. I study their words and what their words sound like, over and over again.

Learning is a tunnel experience that makes us think more broadly.

I call the language of political figures, pundits and administrators "the haute couture of language."

We who are in the arts are at the risk of being in a popularity contest rather than a profession. If that fact causes you despair . . . pick another profession. Your desire to communicate must be bigger than your relationship with the chaotic and unfair realities . . . We have to create our own standards of discipline.

I feel like my work has been my path to freedom from having grown up in a segregated environment.