The ideal, it seems to me, is to show things happening and allow the reader to decide what they mean.

I don't think anyone wants a reader to be completely lost - certainly not to the point of giving up - but there's something to be said for a book that isn't instantly disposable, that rewards a second reading.

The people who don't like it tend to dislike it intensely. That's unfortunate, but not surprising when one deliberately goes against audience expectations.

We're not lost. We're locationally challenged.

Sometimes the reader will decide something else than the author's intent; this is certainly true of attempts to empirically decipher reality.

Naturally, the reader has access only to the events I show and the way I show them, but as has been said, there's generally a good deal of ambiguity in that presentation.

There are readers who want every point to be clearly and unambiguously set forth, and there are those who want to pry ideas and meanings out for themselves.

The cynical part of the answer is that I expect to see a good deal more space opera, set far enough in the future as to be disconnected from contemporary issues.

Well, it's an adventure story, and a Bildungsroman, of course, but there was also the intention to describe a culture that had been seen in rather narrow terms.

If I were to write Web now, it would be a much, much darker book.

I'm very happy that the New York Times has spoken well of my stuff; who wouldn't be? But it's not a choice I made.

At one point I intended to write precursor and sequel novels, about the establishment of the Web and its next evolution, but I am very unlikely to now; they would take place in a different universe.

The ideal, it seems to me, is to show things happening and allow the reader to decide what they mean.

The language fictional characters use is chosen for effect, at least if the author is concentrating.

People tell me they laughed hard enough to wake their spouses, that they've given away numerous copies to friends, and that it's the one Trek book they'll give to people they wouldn't expect to like others.

There are people who believe in an absolutely transparent prose; with every respect for clarity of expression, I don't.

Creating the fictional background for a game world isn't significantly different from creating a background for fiction.

If you tell the truth about how you're feeling, it becomes funny.

I love disappearing. That's what acting is. For me it's about putting on a persona, stepping into a pair of shoes. It's my face, but I'm using it as a tool for that spirit, that character.

Not that I wish by any means to deny, that the mental life of individuals and peoples is also in conformity with law, as is the object of philosophical, philological, historical, moral, and social sciences to establish.

I wouldn't inflict my naked body on any paying audience.

For example, I tend to personally reward myself for specific acts of exceptional discipline.

The true definition of a snob is one who craves for what separates men rather than for what unites them.

I love working in London.

Be careless in your dress if you must but keep a tidy soul.

The spirit of envy can destroy it can never build.

Sensitiveness is closely allied to egotism; and excessive sensibility is only another name for morbid self-consciousness. The cure for tender sensibilities is to make more of our objects and less of our selves.

I think it's important for scientists to speak in their own voices and not just be mediated by journalists or others speaking for them.

Modern American war is as easy to script as a B movie.

I was terribly upset not to be in 'Dickensian,' so I pretend to look down on it. The part I should have played, Mrs. Gamp, is done brilliantly by Pauline Collins, but I entered this world for no other reason than to play that part.

Young quarterbacks do well because they have a great defense.

I just didn't know where I fit in - I didn't seem to fit in my parent's generation. I didn't seem to fit in my own generation. Little by little, this took me into a spiritual search for understanding; a search for meaning and fulfillment.

There are matters in the Bible, said to be done by the express commandment of God, that are shocking to humanity and to every idea we have of moral justice.

Such fire was not by water to be drowned, nor he his nature changed by changing ground.

The question of free will is insoluble on strictly psychological grounds.

For years, we have been asking the E.U. to create something similar to the Russia-NATO council. Not in order to simply exchange opinions and work out recommendations, but to make decisions.

I'm never sure how to rank these things, but I will say that it has been a dream of mine ever since I was a kid to play for the Queen of England. Preferably in the throne room.

I've always said, since I got to know him and wrote about him, that he's the generation he least appeals to is his own and I think in many ways he was born middle-aged and that's become apparent in recent years.

Families are not merely constructs of outdated convention, and traditional marriage laws were not based on animosity toward homosexuals. Rather, I believe that the traditional family structure - centered on a lawful union between one man and one woman - comports with nature and with our Judeo-Christian moral tradition.

Just the other day I pulled out this old cassette of Ragged Glory and I popped it into my cassette player and I was digging it. They were just a great rock and roll band, one that presents the song ahead of everything else - there's no grand idea or concept behind it.

There's a lot I've missed about living in Ireland. You miss family, particularly when you've got kids.