It is only through disruptions and confusion that we grow, jarred out of ourselves by the collision of someone else's private world with our own.

The other book that I worry no one reads anymore is James Joyce's Ulysses. It's not easy, but every page is wonderful and repays the effort. I started reading it in high school, but I wasn't really able to grasp it. Then I read it in college. I once spent six weeks in a graduate seminar reading it. It takes that long. That's the problem. No one reads that way anymore. People may spend a week with a book, but not six.

The greatest works of literature seem to embody both "art" and "morality".

Food doesn't exist, but can only be invented. And reinvented.

Much in our lives is chance.

Among many of my friends and acquaintances, I seem to be one of the very few individuals who felt or feels no ambivalence about my mother. All my feelings for my mother were positive, very strong and abiding.

I learned long ago that being Lewis Carroll was infinitely more exciting than being Alice.