Is there any mystery like who you finally turn out to be.

Anyone who teaches knows that you don't really experience a text until you've taught it, in loving detail, with an intelligent and responsive class.

The written word, obviously, is very inward, and when we're reading, we're thinking. It's a sort of spiritual, meditative activity. When we're looking at visual objects, I think our eyes are obviously directed outward, so there's not as much reflective time. And it's the reflectiveness and the spiritual inwardness about reading that appeals to me.

My parents inspired me by their example. They both grew up in the Depression, and both of them had to quit school when they were quite young to work, because there actually was no choice. So they've always impressed me with their resilience, their good spirits, their courage. I just remember them carrying on and just doing their lives. They really made a strong impression on me.

Running! If there's any activity happier, more exhilarating, more nourishing to the imagination, I can't think of what it might be.

How fascinating to a child are words: the shapes, sounds, textures and mysterious meanings of words; the way words link together into elastic patterns called "sentences." And these sentences into paragraphs, and beyond.

What is a family, after all, except memories? Haphazard and precious as the contents of a catch-all drawer in the kitchen.