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.

Through first-class education, a generation marches down the long uncertain road of the future with confidence.

In student government in high school, I learned how to deal with people, and in college I studied Eastern philosophy. I'm also an avid team-sports fan. I think I just blended them all together and came out with a business management philosophy that combines the Eastern ethic with the Western sport concept, basically.

I had a really dark time after the Olympic Games... But then I said to myself, 'This is a sport that's blessed me with a home, with an education, with some money. I can't hate this sport. This sport took me out of Louisiana. This sport gave me a chance when so many people don't get a chance. And I love this sport.'

I was one those kids who had books on them. Before weddings, Bar Mitzvahs, funerals and anything else where you're actually meant to not be reading, my family would frisk me and take the book away. If they didn't find it by this point in the procedure, I would be sitting over in that corner completely unnoticed just reading my book.