Storytellers are a threat. They threaten all champions of control, they frighten usurpers of the right-to-freedom of the human spirit -- in state, in church or mosque, in party congress, in the university or wherever.

There is a certain increase in the importance I assign to women in getting us out of the mess that we are in, which is a reflection of the role of women in my traditional culture - that they do not interfere in politics until men really make such a mess that the society is unable to go backward or forward. Then women will move in.

A pen on paper is the ideal way for me. I am not really very comfortable with machines; I never learned to type very well.

The triumph of the written word is often attained when the writer achieves union and trust with the reader, who then becomes ready to be drawn into unfamiliar territory, walking in borrowed literary shoes so to speak, toward a deeper understanding of self or society, or of foreign peoples, cultures, and situations.

Once you allow yourself to identify with the people in a story, then you might begin to see yourself in that story even if on the surface it's far removed from your situation.

That we are surrounded by deep mysteries is known to all but the incurably ignorant.

No man however great is greater than his people