What would men be without women? Scarce, sir, mighty scarce. Mark Twain Women are an alien race set down among us.

The - writing is a kind of act of aggression, and a person who is not aggressive in his normal, may I say, intercourse with humanity might well be an aggressive writer.

I'm willing to show good taste, if I can, in somebody else's living room, but our reading life is too short for a writer to be in any way polite. Since his words enter into another's brain in silence and intimacy, he should be as honest and explicit as we are with ourselves.

Movies are, like sharp sunlight, merciless; we do not imagine, we view.

The Founding Fathers in their wisdom decided that children were an unnatural strain on parents. So they provided jails called schools, equipped with tortures called an education.

Writing and rewriting are a constant search for what it is one is saying.

President George] Bush talked to us like we were a bunch of morons and we ate it up. Can you imagine, the Pledge of Allegiance, read my lips-can you imagine such crap in this day and age?