Around us, we do see attempts to delegitimize Israel, a sort of secret, hidden anti-Semitism growing in many countries, often on the right but also on the left.

Real stories - whether in pure fiction or historical - have a certain indefinable power; we are endlessly curious about the past and hungry for learning that we hope will illuminate the present.

Historical fiction is simply fiction set in the past, and should be judged as such.

When I'm up, I'm over-exuberant; when I'm down, I just wander round on my own. I have no middle space.

The world rolls round forever like a mill; it grinds out death and life and good and ill; it has no purpose, heart or mind or will.

I have come to regard November as the older, harder man's October. I appreciate the early darkness and cooler temperatures. It puts my mind in a different place than October. It is a month for a quieter, slightly more subdued celebration of summer's death as winter tightens its grip.

I don't believe in death.

And this administration and this House leadership have said, quote-unquote, they will stop at nothing to pass this health care bill. And now they've gotten rid of me and it will pass. You connect the dots.