I wanted to impress people because I was kind of a kid who was lost in the crowd - was sort of my, feeling about childhood was being part of a big family.

As a New Yorker, I'm someone who lives on an island and looks across to America.

Literature is the safe and traditional vehicle through which we learn about the world and pass on values from on generation to the next. Books save lives.

I didn't really understand that Vipassana is a relatively new form of Buddhism that was based on the storage of pain. So the idea is that every time you don't scream, that's your Buddhist side.

The main thing that attracts me to Buddhism is probably what attracts every artist to being an artist - that it's a godlike thing. You are the ultimate authority. There is no other ultimate authority.

Besides all those whaling details, Moby Dick is about someone who's looking for something so huge, something they've wanted all their life, yet they know when they find it, it will kill them.

Not many people care what you do. They care about what you do as much as you care about what they do. Think about it. Just exactly that much. You are not the center of the universe.