The Church expected the Second Coming of Christ immediately. The converts had known a first coming. And then? And then! That was the trouble — the then. He had come, and they adored and believed, they communicated and practiced, and waited. The the...
Writing a novel is not at all like riding a bike. Writing a novel is like having to redesign a bike, based on laws of physics that you don't understand, in a new universe. So having written one novel does nothing for you when you have to write the se...
The first half of the 20th century belongs to Picasso, and the second half is about photography. They said digital would kill photography because everyone can do it, but they said that about the box brownie in 1885 when it came out. It makes photogra...
I was extraordinarily lucky. I wrote a book because I wanted to see if I could write a mystery. Someone nagged me into sending it to a contest, which it won, after which I was offered a two-book contract, thus requiring the writing of a second book.
I look for two things when I am about to launch into a book. First, there has to be a dramatic arc to the story itself that will carry me, and the reader, from beginning to end. Second, the story has to weave through larger themes that can illuminate...
'Moonwalking with Einstein' refers to a memory device I used when I memorized a deck of playing cards at the U.S. Memory Championship. When I competed in 2006, I set a new U.S. record by memorizing a deck of cards in one minute and 40 seconds. That r...
I really found this campaign odious. I couldn't get up for it. The quality of the candidates and the campaign, I just found the whole thing second-rate. I didn't know how to explain to my granddaughter that I was spending my dotage writing about Al G...
My first season with Pittsburgh was 1969. We were still in the old NFL. My second year, we moved to the AFC when the leagues merged. I went to the Pro Bowl that season, and there must have been nine Raiders and nine Chiefs. I got to know all those gu...
For reasons that are both fair and foul - but mostly for fair reasons - we have come under the domain of a scientific-management system whose ambitions are endless. They want to manage every second of our lives, every expenditure that we make. And th...
The freedom of patient speech is necessary if the doctor is to get clues about the medical enigma before him. If the patient is inhibited, or cut off prematurely, or constrained into one path of discussion, then the doctor may not be told something v...
Back in George W. Bush's second term, when diplomatic realism began to overtake foolish bellicosity, the president developed one of his patented nicknames for the two most powerful neoconservative journalists, William Kristol and Charles Krauthammer:...
[after Mowgli pushes Kaa's coils off him the second and last time] Mowgli: [angry] You told me a lie, Kaa. You said I could trust you! Kaa: It's like YOU said: you can't trust ANYONE!
Kirk: Time? Saavik: Three minutes, thirty seconds. Kirk: Distance from Reliant? Chekov: 4000 kilometers. Sulu: We're not going to make it, are we? [Kirk turns to look at David, who slowly shakes his head]
I was a big fan of 'Six Feet Under.' So, I got a bootleg copy of the first four episodes on videotape, watched them and was instantly into it. During the first episode, I was like, 'Eh.' By the time I got to the second one, I couldn't watch them fast...
I'm a hip-hop guy, and the first time I heard Eminem was in '96. He was on a record with Shabban Siddiq. I was like, 'Who is this guy? He's dope!' First album came out: awesome. Second album came out: awesome. Third album, I was like, 'Eh.' He starte...
It felt like I'd been playing second-string football for a long time, when, suddenly, I was playing in the Super Bowl. Even when 'Basic Instinct' was a hit, I still felt like I was running with that ball toward the end zone. It took awhile for me to ...
Conspirator: Do you still feel suicidal? Alex: Well, put it this way, I feel very low in myself. I can't see much in the future, and I feel that any second something terrible is going to happen to me. [slumps into spaghetti]
Otto: Nice fish, Ken. You know what Nietzsche said about animals? "They were God's second blunder." Ken: Well, you t-t-t-tell him from me that I kuh-kuh, I kuh-kuh...
Karen: [after Henry has stood her up on what was to be their second date] You got some nerve standing me up like that last night! Nobody does that to me! Who the Hell do you think you are? Frankie Valli or some kinda bigshot?
John Coffey: [after being locked inside his prison cell, he looks up at Paul] I couldn't help it, Boss. I tried to take it back... but it was too late. [Paul glances at John Coffey for a second and walks away]
Col. Hans Landa: What a tremendously hostile world that a rat must endure. Yet not only does he survive, he thrives. Because our little foe has an instinct for survival and preservation second to none... And that, Monsieur, is what a Jew shares with ...
