History is replete with proofs, from Cato the Elder to Kennedy the Younger, that if you scratch a statesman you find an actor, but it is becoming harder and harder, in our time, to tell government from show business.

I love the idea of there being two sexes, don't you?

I loathe the expression “What makes him tick.” It is the American mind, looking for simple and singular solutions, that uses the foolish expression. A person not only ticks, he also chimes and strikes the hour, falls and breaks and has to be put together again, and sometimes stops like an electric clock in a thunderstorm.

The things we laugh at are awful while they are going on, but get funny when we look back. And other people laugh because they've been through it too. The closest thing to humor is tragedy.

I don't believe the writer should know too much where he's going. If he does, he runs into old man blueprint—old man propaganda.

When all things are equal, translucence in writing is more effective than transparency, just as glow is more revealing than glare.

These are the days of bootleg love.