I’ve seen how you can’t learn anything when you’re trying to look like the smartest person in the room.

When you pick up a novel from the bed side table, you put down your own life at the same time and you become another person for the duration.

It's a funny thing: people often ask how I discipline myself to write. I can't begin to understand the question. For me, the discipline is turning off the computer and leaving my desk to do something else.

Does a man become a revolutionary out of the belief he's entitled to joy rather than submission?

When you're given a brilliant child you polish her and let her shine. Pigs in Heaven

I wonder that religion can live or die on the strength of a faint, stirring breeze. The scent trail shifts, causing the predator to miss the pounce. One god draws in the breath of life and rises; another god expires.

As a biologist, I can't think of myself as anything but an animal among animals and plant.