Every year, August lashes out in volcanic fury, rising with the din of morning traffic, its great metallic wings smashing against the ground, heating the air with ever-increasing intensity.

The arts in America exist in spite of America, not because of America.

I'm usually busy - if you call me at the house, I get about four phone calls there a year - I'm usually running around the house with a pen in my mouth holding onto something, folding it, or doing something to it, and it's always a bad time.

The tasks I set out for myself are what I do to beat the perfect pointlessness of life.

It is impossible, after a certain point, to go back to a previous way of life, a previous way of thinking.

The average is the borderline that keeps mere men in their place. Those who step over the line are heroes by the very act. Go.

Quite often governments are one way and the people are another. You can't judge the many by the actions of a few. What if Americans were all judged by the actions of the Bush administration and people did not know the truth? That America is full of people who are, at present, poorly represented and poorly catered to by the media. All these places I go, people say that America is good and I'm like, "Well, thank you, I'm glad you can see it." And you know - we are good, we've just got work to do.