I tell beginning readers to read a lot and write a lot. If you want to write a book, find a subject that's really worth the time and effort you'll put in.

Most teachers have little control over school policy or curriculum or choice of texts or special placement of students, but most have a great deal of autonomy inside the classroom. To a degree shared by only a few other occupations, such as police work, public education rests precariously on the skill and virtue of the people at the bottom of the institutional pyramid.

If you live in the same small place long enough, something you don't like is bound to happen

That's when I feel most alive, he told me once on an airplane, when I'm helping people.

I'm going to a commune in Vermont and will deal with no unit of time shorter than a season.

...Attempts at imitation would put the emphasis where it didn't belong. The goal was to improve the lives of others, not oneself.

What interests me is trying to catch the reflection of the human being on the page. I'm interested in how ordinary people live their lives