'Curiosity never killed this cat’ — that’s what I’d like as my epitaph.

I said, "Suppose communists come out against cancer, do we have to automatically come out for cancer?'" I can't take back that I'm against the poll tax, that I'm against lynching, that I'm for peace.

One of the definitive works on gay life. Through this collective testimony we may come to understand what it is to be 'the other'; in short, the other part of ourselves.

The issue is jobs. You can't get away from it: jobs. Having a buck or two in your pocket and feeling like somebody.

The people in Coming of Age were far less curmudgeonly than you would think. The greater percentage said that without the young we'd be lost. One woman, a former Southern belle, now 87, a philanthropist, says, "Well, these young, their history's been stolen from them. And what have we done to make them respect us?"

One day I visited a guy who had made a fortune as a broker. He was sitting in his office with his computer. I hire people from here and make deals from this room, he told me. Then he took me to the trading room. Nobody was talking to anybody else, the place was silent as a tomb, they were all sitting there watching their terminals - a great word, terminal. I tell you, it scares the crap out of me.

But once you become active in something, something happens to you. You get excited and suddenly you realize you count.