I beat my sons in real-life table tennis, but virtually, I get murdered. I download games on the iPhone that I'm addicted to - I'm a master at "Angry Birds."

The Republicans were not always insane. They might've had politics I didn't agree with, but they weren't always actually certifiable.

Original thought, original artistic expression is by its very nature questioning, irreverent, iconoclastic.

A relationship with an imaginary woman is preferable to a relationship with a real one.

What I've always tried to find in my books are points at which the private lives of the characters, and also my own, intersect with the public life of the culture.

And at the end of the day, there was an attempt to suppress a book. The book wasn't suppressed. It's freely available in whatever it is, close to 50 languages. There was an attempt to suppress the writer. And I'm happy to say the writer wasn't suppressed.

The acceptance that all that is solid has melted into the air, that reality and morality are not givens but imperfect human constructs, is the point from which fiction begins.