In some mysterious way woods have never seemed to me to be static things. In physical terms, I move through them; yet in metaphysical ones, they seem to move through me.

The most important questions in life can never be answered by anyone except oneself.

Content is a word unknown to life; it is also a word unknown to man.

There are only two races on this planet - the intelligent and the stupid.

We all write poems; it is simply that poets are the ones who write in words.

In some mysterious way woods have never seemed to me to be static things. In physical terms, I move through them; yet in metaphysical ones, they seem to move through me.

Most marriages recognize this paradox: Passion destroys passion; we want what puts an end to wanting what we want.

There comes a time in each life like a point of fulcrum. At that time you must accept yourself. It is not anymore what you will become. It is what you are and always will be.

Men love war because it allows them to look serious. Because it is the one thing that stops women laughing at them.

The supposed great misery of our century is the lack of time.

There are many reasons why novelists write, but they all have one thing in common - a need to create an alternative world.

I don't think the English like me. I sold a colossal best seller in America, and they never really forgave me.

That is the great distinction between the sexes. Men see objects, women see the relationships between objects.

Our accepting what we are must always inhibit our being what we ought to be.

In essence the Renaissance was simply the green end of one of civilization's hardest winters.

An answer is always a form of death.

Duty largely consists of pretending that the trivial is critical.

Follow the accident, fear the fixed plan--that is the rule.

Adulthood is not an age, but a stage of knowledge of self.

Being an atheist is a matter not of moral choice, but of human obligation.

Baseball and cricket are beautiful and highly stylized medieval war substitutes chess made flesh a mixture of proud chivalry and base in both senses greed.

To write poetry and to commit suicide apparently so contradictory had really been the same attempts at escape.

There are two kinds of hangover in one you feel ill and incapable in the other you feel ill and lucid.

The newspapers are full of what we would like to happen to us and what we hope will never happen to us.

Wolves don't hunt singly, but always in pairs. The lone wolf was a myth.

It must essentially remain a novel of adolescence written by a retarded adolescent.

I don't have any shame about the way I conducted my professional life.

Some critics said, 'Hey, why are you writing historical novels?' I say they're not historical, they're contemporary, because people walking around who lived through this, even a little bit, they carry it inside. The contemporary isn't just what you can see now.

Heroes, whatever high ideas we may have of them, are mortal and not divine. We are all as God made us and many of us much worse.

We are, of course, now against any other group burning Qurans. We would right now ask no one to burn Qurans. We are absolutely strong on that. It is not the time to do it.

I have lectured at Town Hall N.Y., The Library of Congress, Harvard, Yale, Amherst, Wellesley, Columbia, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Louisiana State University, Colorado, Stanford, and scores of other places.

I like a man who grins when he fights.

I never forget that I'm extremely fortunate.

A workshop is a way of renting an audience, and making sure you're communicating what you think you're communicating. It's so easy as a young writer to think you're been very clear when in fact you haven't.

Brought together by blood, kept together by love.

It's Fendi. French, Fendi, both start with an F... I fell in love with it. Smells like grown-man cologne.

Evil events from evil causes spring.

My dad believed in scaring us as we were growing up. Scaring the boys who wanted to date us more.

We've got to understand that the ages of zero to three are the most formative years of a person's life, the time they learn the concept of reward and punishment and develop a conscience, and that 50 percent of all learned human response is learned in the first year of life.

The challenge to America is to extend to Asia the defensive shield of American power in forms consonant with Asian freedom and self-respect.

You are the sum total of the choices you make every day.

The Spy Act strikes a right balance between preserving legitimate and benign uses of this technology, while still, at the same time, protecting unwitting consumers from the harm caused when it is misused and, of course, designed for nefarious purposes.

The simplest kind of guidance critique comes every day and many times a day in the form of discomfort.

When my kids were growing up, I wanted their teachers to teach them science, reading, math and history. I also wanted them to care about my kids. But I did not want my children's public school teachers teaching them religion. That was my job as a parent and the job of our church, Sunday school, and youth group.

Each thought that is welcomed and recorded is a nest egg by the side of which more will be laid.

I went to Bournemouth Film School for 3 years.

When I wake up, I expect things to be good. If they're not, then I try to set about trying to make them as good as I can 'cause I know I'm gonna have to live that day anyway. So why not try to make the most of it if you can? Some days, they pan out a little better than others, but you still gotta always just try.

As we grow as unique persons we learn to respect the uniqueness of others.

All powers all laws are but the fair embodied thoughts of God.