If there had been a job of being a reader, I would have taken that, because I love to read and I don't love to write. That would be blissful.

Nothing lasts. So it's my belief, yes, I know a lot of the things that we liked didn't last, but maybe things we don't like, they're also not going to last. There has been progress in my lifetime. There are certainly things that are better than when I was young, and there are things that are worse. New York City, it's worse. There's no question.

Until I was about 7, I thought books were just there, like trees. When I learned that people actually wrote them, I wanted to, too, because all children aspire to inhuman feats like flying. Most people grow up to realize they can't fly. Writers are people who don't grow up to realize they can't be God.

Did it ever occur to anyone that if you put nice libraries in public schools you wouldn't have to put them in prisons?

Your responsibility as a parent is not as great as you might imagine. You need not supply the world with the next conqueror of disease or major motion picture star. If your child simply grows up to be someone who does not use the word "collectible" as a noun, you can consider yourself an unqualified success.

You sit or stand in the subway, and you look around - I do, because I don't have a phone so I'm not playing a game - and you see people.

When I saw a phone on a plane for the first time, I panicked ... I thought people were going to call me.