I have a deep suspicion of social institutions and tradition in general.

Life is challenging for everyone. If someone can believe that he's a sovereign in his tiny domain, it's just an adaptation to life.

I had a bumper sticker on my car for a long time that said, "Kill your television." People helpfully pointed out that I was a total fraud because I was a television writer.

You have to respect people's suffering. To deny that the world is unfair and painful for most of the people living in it would be false and judgmental.

I find that the creative side of my brain and the archival side of my brain don't work well together. When I've done my best work, I've been in a trance-like state.

If there's reason for hope, it lies in man's occasional binges of cooperation. To save our planet, we'll need that kind of heroic effort, in which all types of people join forces for the common good

For me, marriage is a grotesque, unforgiving, clunky contrivance. Yet society pushes it as a shimmering ideal.