Smoking is the great romance of my lifetime. If I could find someone I wanted forty-five times a day, perhaps I could stop.

Take away a man's actual sense of manhood - which is conventionally based on the ability to work, to earn money, to be self-sufficient, to provide for children - and you've got to give them something else. And they did.

Whenever I am doing anything else, which is most of the time, even if it is not something like robbing a bank, I feel felonious. Writing is what I'm supposed to be doing.

Things that people will say to me, mostly, is that you shouldn't have all these books. It's too expensive.

Do not approach with anything even resembling assurance a restaurant that moves.

There is one thing that has disappeared, not just from the U.S. but from the entire world, is the idea of ever being embarrassed by anything.

I used to buy all my shirts at Brooks Brothers, but that was completely ruined about 20 years ago. They discontinued the shirt I liked. If I had only known this - I mean, if you're going to discontinue an item that thousands and thousands of people buy, announce it. Say, 'We will no longer be making our excellent Brooks Brothers cotton shirts that we made for 5,000 years. We're going to change them in some awful way. We're alerting you so you can buy a lifetime supply.' Shirts don't go bad, they're not peaches.