My goal is to break three hours in a marathon.

A good athlete always mentally replays a competition over and over, even in victory, to see what might be done to improve the performance the next time.

Right now, after having had back surgery, I am finally back to running again.

Really, I think that going out and playing with your friends is kind of becoming a lost art, with the kids in the neighborhood.

In the '60s, I was teaching humanities at a college in upstate New York and trying to publish a novel I'd written in graduate school. But nothing was happening. So I moved to New York City and got a job as a messenger at a place that made movies.

I fell in love with reading when I was allowed to choose whatever books I wanted to check out of the library. I was around nine years old when I began choosing my own books in earnest.

I always think the relationship between a teacher and a student should be short and maybe violent. You don't need to spend years together. All you need is an explosion: you are the material to explode; the teacher is the detonator.

Education teaches us compassion and kindness, connection to others.