In the past, I played in bands, worked at coffee shops, babysat, and worked as a production assistant.

As a kid, I loved Paula Poundstone and Richard Pryor. But my mother was a huge influence on my comedy.

I take a lot of ladies' vitamins, because I never buy my own and that's what's in the house. More iron.

Why do some memories live only on your tongue or in your nose? Why do others always stay in your heart?

The problem is not the problem. The problem is your attitude about the problem. Got that? -Coach Brevin

She loved her mother and depended on her mother, and yet every single word her mother said annoyed her.

My favorite definition of an intellectual: 'Someone who has been educated beyond his/her intelligence'.

We stand now at the turning point between two eras. Behind us is a past to which we can never return...

If people want to take their lives and are helped to do so, the punishment is tragic for all concerned.

People don't really see television shows and movies as different anymore. They expect the same quality.

Of course I don't think I have it made by any means. I'm too insecure, obsessive and paranoid for that.

If you're gonna fret, fret over something you can change. Then stop fretting and do something about it.

Henry Miller, Jack Kerouac, Albert Camus, Graham Greene - they influenced my life to a profound extent.

To me, writing is a considered act. It's something which is a great labor of thought and consideration.

I am not a politics wonk. I like the idea of my writing reflecting more about who I am or other people.

Stories are the most important thing in the world. Without stories, we wouldn't be human beings at all.

It’s like having to make a choice: a blessing or a curse. The one thing you can’t do is choose neither.

If egotism means a terrific interest in one's self, egotism is absolutely essential to efficient living.

Two possibilities exist: Either we are alone in the Universe or we are not. Both are equally terrifying.

I sometimes think that the universe is a machine designed for the perpetual astonishment of astronomers.

Of course, if you assume a big enough conspiracy, you can explain anything, including the cosmos itself.

The best books come from someplace inside. You don't write because you want to, but because you have to.

Do you like reading? It's the best thing that can happen to you in life. Writing has other implications.

My main interest in being a director, and the most important thing to me, is that world with the actors.

It is strange how fragile this man-creature is.....in one second he's just garbage. Garbage, that's all.

Since I'm essentially optimistic, I can't imagine a world in which man is totally decimated or degraded.

And that is all anyone can do, try to be honest about what he feels, what he's seen or thinks he's seen.

People test movies within an inch of their life so that the entire audience experience is a uniform one.

Recognition should come to the reporter who uncovers public cheating or proves a convicted man innocent.

Lee was too cool by nature to rage at fate; his manner was to raise an eyebrow and greet it laconically.

I read a book a day when I was a kid. My family was not literary; we did not have any books in the house.

Can you imagine how it is, to want to be neither inside nor outside, to want to be nowhere and disappear?

Please don't judge me too much until you are older and know more things. (Spoken from mother to daughter)

I am not a perfect friend, and it is impossible not to rebuff or be rebuffed if you move about the world.

Maybe part of find what you wanted was recognizing what you didn't want. Maybe there was hope for me yet.

All cows were like other cows, all tigers like all other tigers - What on earth happened to human beings?

I like to go back over history and check out what people have written and whether I agree with it or not.

Suddenly question number four popped into my mind. Have you thought about how this relationship will end?

I can't read fiction when I'm writing fiction, because I get intimidated if I read something really good.

It is the restrictions placed on vice by our social code which makes its pursuit so peculiarly agreeable.

You can tell whether a man is clever by his answers. You can tell whether a man is wise by his questions.

We are passing through a very sensitive time, and on the whole, this country is facing very big problems.

A place that doesn't welcome tourists, that's really difficult and off the map, is a place I want to see.

People test movies within an inch of their life, so that the entire audience experience is a uniform one.

When it comes to telling children stories, they don’t need simple language. They need beautiful language.

I'm with the Grimms on this: stories for young and old. You can't characterize them any better than that.

I felt the kind of desperation, I think, that cancels the possibility of empathy...that makes you unkind.

If she doesn't speak, she is making a choice. If she doesn't try, she can lose her chance forever. -An-mei

The forbidden things were a great influence on my life. I was forbidden from reading A Catcher in the Rye.

Poetry. I read Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, and Jane Hirschfield. I like to read Billy Collins out loud.

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