I "love" reading. It makes me feel like I am swallowing up Christ, Homer, Confucius, Newton, Franklin, Socrates, Caesar, and the whole world into one gigantic invincible Sir Moffat. Mine is creative reading. I read building empires in mind. I pray I ...
I never rebel so much against France as not to regard Paris with a friendly eye; she has had my heart since my childhood.... I love her tenderly, even to her warts and her spots. I am French only by this great city: the glory of France, and one of th...
I get an abundance of e-mail every day, some say 'dear Richard, can you call my husband, he weighs 400 pounds...' or 'my 14-year-old is 200 pounds...' or 'I just got divorced, no one wants me, I am 500 pounds.' So I pick up the phone and I call peopl...
Engineers are either aggressive or passive aggressive. You need to just dive straight into it, and sometimes there are social repercussions because of it. The impression that people had of me was that I was really harsh, hard-edged, brusque, and to t...
I get up at seven yeah and I go to work at nine. I got no time for livin'. Yes I'm workin' all the time. It seems to me I could live my life a lot better than I think I am. I guess that's why they call me they call me the workin' man.
When I look in the mirror, I am slightly reminded of self-portraits by Durer and by Rembrandt, because they both show a degree of introspection. I see some element of disappointment; I see a sense of humour, but also something that is faintly ridicul...
My foray into young adult lit was by no means planned. I wrote the first 'Alfred Kropp' book as an adult novel, which everyone loved but no one would publish - until I changed my protagonist from a thirty-something P.I. into a 15-year-old kid. After ...
You know, I am mainstream America, and it really doesn't matter what party you're in. When you call your children and you say 'How are you?' - and what you are really asking is, 'Do you still have your job? And are you able to make the mortgage payme...
One of the lessons that I grew up with was to always stay true to yourself and never let what somebody else says distract you from your goals. And so when I hear about negative and false attacks, I really don't invest any energy in them, because I kn...
I know that I come from mid-20th century America, urban, specifically downtown New York, specifically an Italian-American area, Roman Catholic - that's who I am. And a part of what I know is there's a decency to people who tried to make a living in t...
I am not sure exactly what heaven will be like, but I know that when we die and it comes time for God to judge us, he will not ask, 'How many good things have you done in your life?' rather he will ask, 'How much love did you put into what you did?
My father and mother are both very smart people and I always felt I was a little short of the mark. So I would compensate with a character like Logan Cale. He's wearing glasses, he's in a wheelchair, he's a computer genius. He's very far away from wh...
I never cut my neighbor's throat; My neighbor's gold I never stole; I never spoiled his house and land; But God have mercy on my soul! For I am haunted night and day By all the deeds I have not done; O unattempted loveliness! O costly valor never won...
Nkrumah declared that we faced neither East nor West but we faced forward. But, see, we can face forward and just look at the horizon. Sometimes, as I think of Ghana, I am tempted to believe that we kept looking East and West and never made up our mi...
My name is Sabastian. I had a father, but he is dead. I had a mother, but she is dead to me. I have a brother, and I will Bind him to me. I have a sister, and I will teach her to love me. My name is Sabastain, and I am going to burn down the world
Yeah, I did see where the people dissing me were coming from. But, it's like, anything that happened in the past between black and white, I can't really speak on it, because I wasn't there. I don't feel like me being born the color I am makes me any ...
I am the jongleur. I leap and pirouette, and make you laugh. I make fun of those in power, and I show you how puffed up and conceited are the big shots who go around making wars in which we are the ones who get slaughtered. I reveal them for what the...
How is it that I am completely naked while you haven’t shed even one stitch of clothing?” “Because you were dinner, Rebecca.” A snort escaped, mixing with her laughter. “Remind me to have dinner with you more often. I have been missing out....
Wherever I am, the world comes after me. It offers me its busyness. It does not believe that I do not want it. Now I understand why the old poets of China went so far and high into the mountains, then crept into the pale mist.
Often as a poet I find that I am somewhat outside an experience I want to hold onto, consciously taking mental notes or writing them down in my journal - for fear that I will forget. It's not unlike being on a trip and taking pictures, your face behi...
When I am in situations where I break out of the pattern, it's hard on me. Once you get used to regular scripture study, you miss it if you don't have it. It's like food - you have to have it. I know that I need the scriptures like I need food. I don...
