I have never written anything in one draft, not even a grocery list, although I have heard from friends that this is actually possible.

Actually, writers have no business writing about their own works. They either wax conceited, saying things like: 'My brilliance is possibly most apparent in my dazzling short story, "The Cookiepants Hypotenuse."' Or else they get unbearably cutesy: 'My cat Ootsywootums has given me all my best ideas, hasn't oo, squeezums?

One has not lived until one has carried a sixty-pound dog down a sweeping flight of stairs at half-past V in the morning.

That's what the movies do. They don't entertain us, they don't send the message: 'We care.' They give us lines to say, they assign us parts: John Wayne, Theda Bara, Shirley Temple, take your pick.

It is my belief that everything you need to know about the world can be learned in a church choir.

You shouldn't be looking for the secret to making people follow fads, you should be looking for the secret to making them think for themselves. Because that's what science is all about.

To do something for someone or something you loved-England or Shakespeare or a dog or the Hodbins or history-wasn't a sacrifice at all. Even if it cost you your freedom, your life, your youth.