These things - the degree of vulnerability, the degree of skill, the degree of the longing to give - are influx all the time, And to lump all that under the word "creativity" assumes something much more static than it is. That's why an artist may be marvelous in her 20s, and be creating automatic crap in her 40s. A writer may be trivial in his 20s, and be writing incredibly in his 50s, because those things are always in flux.

I always thought Cyrano De Bergerac was a coward. He could fight a hundred swordsmen, but he was afraid of his nose, and he was afraid of Roxanne. Jam as cowardly as anybody about facing my fears. So, you spend your you years as an artist fighting those hundred people that you happen not to fear. Then you wake up one morning and realize all this time you're afraid of your nose. That's what you're going to have to face for the rest of your life. And you don't feel very courageous. But, if you don't face it, you dry up as an artist.

Our choices are truncated in evil's presence.

There are writers I know and respect who are very good about what's outside, and not too hot about what's inside.

Be careful how you choose your enemy, for you will come to resemble him. The moment you adapt your enemy's methods your enemy has won. The rest is suffering and historical opera.

When the people clamor to be shielded from reality, when they praise their government for keeping things from them, when they choose to conduct their lives within the limits of whatever fantasy the government supplies, then they are no longer consenting to be governed, they are begging to be ruled.

It may be that it is not given to us to know when we are angels. We may only be given to know when others are. This may be one of the reasons we need each other so.