I think the sport of wrestling, which I became involved with at the age of 14... I competed until I was 34, kind of old for a contact sport. I coached the sport until I was 47. I think the discipline of wrestling has given me the discipline I have to write.

I grew up in a family where, through my teenage years, I was expected to go to church on Sunday. It wasn't terribly painful.

If you feel strongly about people having abortions, don't have one. But we are a country - USA - that likes to be punitive. We want to restrict. It is a kind of religious fervor run amuck.

Newspapers are even worse for me than ice cream; headlines, and the big issues that generate the headlines, are pure fat.

I feel more a part of the wrestling community than I feel I belong to the community of arts and letters. Why? Because wrestling requires even more dedication than writing because wrestling represents the most difficult and rewarding objective that I have ever dedicated myself to; because wrestling and wrestling coaches are among the most disciplined and self-sacrificing people I have ever known.

He also knew that rivals are best unmanned by being ignored.

But I often think that so-called glamorous people are just very busy people.