I have written a lot about snakes. There's something pretty primordial about it.

. . . I wrote a letter to Thomas Pynchon asking, Can I have your permission to try to make an [adaptation] of your book? And I had no idea that he would answer me, because he's pretty elusive. But he did send a letter back that said, Yes, you can do that - as long as the only instrument in the opera is a banjo. I thought, That's an interesting way of saying No.

People only stutter at the beginning of the word. They're not afraid when they get to the end of the word. There's just regret.

You know, for every dollar a man makes a woman makes 63 cents. Now, fifty years ago that was 62 cents. So, with that kind of luck, it’ll be the year 3,888 before we make a buck.

I kind of didn't believe the doctors when they came over and they said you're not going to be able to walk again. I'm sorry to tell you this. I thought who is this guy? I just was so impatient with the whole thing. I knew I was going to walk again. I knew that I was going to do that.

You know the reason I love the stars is because we can't hurt them: we can't burn them, we can't melt them , we can't make them overflow, we can't flood them or burn them up—so we keep reacing for them

I have written a few children's books. The first book that I wrote was for children. It was called "The Package", and it was a mystery story in pictures. It had no words.