By the time I received my doctorate in American studies in 1957, I was in the twisted grip of a disease of our times in which the sufferer experiences an overwhelming urge to join the 'real world.' So I started working for newspapers.

A glorious place, a glorious age, I tell you! A very Neon renaissance - And the myths that actually touched you at that time - not Hercules, Orpheus, Ulysses and Aeneas - but Superman, Captain Marvel, and Batman.

don't just describe an emotion, arouse it, make them experience it, by manipulating the symbol of the emotion, and sometimes we have to come into awareness through the back door.

The first newspaper I worked on was the 'Springfield Union' in Springfield, Massachusetts. I wrote over a hundred letters to newspapers asking for work and got three responses, two no's.

No machines will ever truly fully figure the brain out, because the brain's performance is constantly altered or else constrained by this inanimate, rogue artifact you can't control, namely, speech.

People complain about my exclamation points, but I honestly think that's the way people think. I don't think people think in essays; it's one exclamation point to another.

I'm a great believer in outlines.