That is sad until one recalls how many bad books the world may yet be spared because of the busyness of writers.

Astronauts: rotarians in outer space.

Movie acting, I later realized, reminds me of contract bridge. Each requires the same concentration, intense short-term memory, and obliviousness to everything else until the last trump is called - or whatever it is they do.

Before the cards that one is dealt by life are the cards that fate has dealt: one's family.

Today's public figures can no longer write their own speeches or books, and there is some evidence that they can't read them either.

The four most beautiful words in our common language: I told you so.

I came out of Capitol Hill. Well, that's just not an ordinary background for a writer of the ordinary American sort.