There's a lot more to publishing a book than writing it and slapping a cover on it.

And when I go around and talk to schools, what I tell the kids are, first of all, you have to accept each other's differences. Some of you are going to be a crappy football player, some of you are going to be a great mathematician. Whatever it is, accept each other's differences and help prop each other up.

just let Mitch be Mitch

[He] saw communism for the sham that it was--a bunch of brutes who seized power in the name of the people, only to repress the very people they claimed to champion.

I have such bad memories, sitting in the back of a classroom, being told, you know, everybody is going to read a paragraph, and skipping ahead to my paragraph and being mortified and trying to read it enough times so that I wouldn't stutter and stammer, getting called on, even in high school.

I think the more avenues that open up when people want to publish, the better. Some of the authors that want to jump ship from the traditional houses and go on their own, you know what? Good luck. It's going to be a lot tougher than you think.

When I give a lot of speeches, they're always on the fly. I mean, I know what I'm going to say roughly, but I do not - will not read.