I do consider the human capacity for violence is the central issue of the social contract. In boxing we have a peculiarly civilized form, in that boxers don't screech and holler. They don't use weapons. All of this seems to me quite amazing, because it is so disciplined, so controlled. It's ritualized, but absolutely genuine. And the cultural structure built around that ritual is absolutely fascinating to me. And it seems to me that boxing is one of those structures that is designed to promote harmony. I think that it is a stove that contains that fire in us and makes it safe and useful.

My worst is all out in the open. It makes it necessary for people to tell you about themselves.

It is coincidence, I decide, and I am getting old and batty, thinking the universe revolves around me.

We survive until, by sheer stamina, we escape into the dim innocence of our own adulthood and its forgetfulness.

It goes in streaks. But some things never go out of fashion.' Hunger artists, fat folks, giants, and dog acts come and go but real freaks never lose their appeal.

I think genetic research is a fascinating and fertile area.

Defining men as the perpetrators of all violence is a viciously immoral judgment of an entire gender. And defining women as inherently nonviolent condemns us to the equally restrictive role of sweet, meek, and weak.