When you put on a clown suit and a rubber nose, nobody has any idea what you look like inside.

I did spend years as an addict, so I know that world, although I wish I didn't.

...belief has a second edge. If there are ten thousand medieval peasants who create vampires by believing them real, there may be one - probably a child - who will imagine the stake necessary to kill it. But a stake is only stupid wood; the mind is the mallet which drives it home.

My childhood was pretty ordinary, except from a very early age, I wanted to be scared. I just did. I was scared afterwards. I wanted a light on, because I was afraid that there was something in the closet. My imagination was very active, even at a young age.

The glory of a good tale is that it is limitless and fluid; a good tale belongs to each reader in its own particular way.

Sometimes the embers are better than the campfire.

This is probably the single great subject of horror fiction: our need to cope with a mystery that can be understood only with the aid of a helpful imagination.