Eisenhower managed to begin the Vietnam war by not following his normal instinct of staying out of mischief. In his memoirs, he tells us why we didn't honor the Geneva accords and hold elections in Vietnam: because some 80 percent of the country would have voted for Ho Chi Minh. This is very candid. The sort of thing one might have found in Stalin'smemoirs, had he not made ghosts even of ghosts.

It was a pity that movies and live TV left New York for Hollywood. London theater, movies, television - until (Britain's) money ran out - were always better than ours since the city was the political capital of the country, as well as the artistic and literary one. In L.A. we've always been slightly sealed off from real life. It's no accident that two of our most interesting directors, Woody Allen and Bob Altman, are more or less settled in the real world.

I come from the highest class of all. I am a third-generation celebrity.

I don't think contemporary writers spend a lot of time reading each other. Particularly writers of the same nationality.

Anybody, at any time, may equally find himself victim or executioner.

If you want to rise in politics in the United States, there is one subject you must stay away from, and that is politics.

The whole point to American journalism is what ought to be true is true.