I never went to a ballet until I was 45 years old. I don't know why.

At the ballet, you really feel like you're in the presence of something outside the rest of your life. Higher than the rest of your life.

If things are going well, if the writing's coming along, I jump out of bed happy. And if the previous day has been bad, I get out of bed disgruntled.

Everything seems to be going faster and faster. It's really harder to create something that endures. The New York City Ballet has succeeded in doing that.

I don't think of my books as being biographies. I never had any interest in doing a book just to write the life of a great man. I had zero interest in that. My interest is in power. How power works.

Robert Moses wasn't elected to anything. We're taught that in a democracy power comes from being elected. He had more power than anyone, and he held it for 48 years

Ballet is sort of a mystery to me. And I don't want to unravel that mystery.