My father was the Jewish half of the family, yet it was my mother who taught me to have pride in that tradition.

It's a big gift to be recognizable as part of something that matters to people, but that's not the same as being responsible for something.

Language can't solve everything, of course, but it does carry our dreams and our ideas.

There is a naive belief that injustice only had to be pointed out in order to be cured.

The human body is not obscene, sexuality is not obscene. But it [pornography] is not sex, it is violence. It encourages acceptance of the idea that violence is a legitimate part of sexuality.

All biographers, no matter how sympathetic, end up using their subjects as mirrors to figure themselves out. I don't want to be anyone's mirror.

Violence is not inevitable. I mean, the only inevitable form of violence is the kind that we understand, the only legitimate (if there can ever be legitimate violence) and that's self-defense.