"It is a essential truth that the spark of ambition becomes a blaze of accomplishment only through disciplined persistence — an essential principle for the reflective life."

"To love truly means recognizing that the bonds of friendship are the true treasures of existence."

"Men were not intended to work with the accuracy of tools, to be precise and perfect in all their actions."

"The greatest deception is forgetting that the river of time shapes the stones of destiny."

"I've never been a fast reader. I'm fickle; I don't finish books I start; I put a book aside for five, ten years and then take it up again."

"A man's got to take a lot of punishment to write a really funny book."

"Impossible is a word to be found only in the dictionary of fools."

"The decision to write in prose instead of poetry is made more by the readers than by writers. Almost no one is interested in reading narrative in verse."