Optimism means better than reality; pessimism means worse than reality. I'm a realist.

The characters [of The Tempest] have always been favorites of mine. It is one of his meditations on art - what it does.

It's impossible to say a thing exactly the way it was, because of what you say can never be exact, you always have to leave something out, there are too many parts, sides, crosscurrents, nuances; too many gestures, which could mean this or that, too many shapes which can never be fully described, too many flavors, in the air or on the tongue, half-colors, too many.

I'm not interested in cutting the feet off my characters or stretching them to make them fit my certain political view.

I tried for the longest time to find out what deconstructionism was. Nobody was able to explain it to me clearly. The best answer I got was from a writer, who said, 'Honey, it's bad news for you and me.

Ordinary, said Aunt Lydia, is what you are used to. This may not seem ordinary to you now, but after a time it will. It will become ordinary.

You quickly find, when you are a hand-reader as I am, that nothing interests people so much as themselves.