Few are there that will leave the secure seclusion of the scholar's life, the peaceful walks of literature and learning, to stand out a target for the criticism of unkind and hostile minds.

No one can fail to see that the power of the Church among large numbers in many communities is today diminishing, or has already ceased.

The Ethical Society, therefore, is like a Church in maintaining, and emphasizing the importance of maintaining the custom of public assemblies on Sunday.

The office of the public teacher is an unenviable and thankless one.

We embrace the shoestring budget. We like being limited by the constraints. It inspires creativity. I don't know what we would spend money on. We don't hire actors. We see budget constraints as a personal challenge. We're like survivalist local commercial directors.

It is a sad fact about our culture that a poet can earn much more money writing or talking about his art than he can by practicing it.

My big goal in life was always to figure out how I can make a lot of money so I can go off and make films irrespective of the opinion of the three or four critics who seem to rule the roost.

Civic poetry is public poetry. It is political poetry. It is about the hard stuff of life: money, crime, gender, corporate excess, racial injustice. It gives expression not just to our rites but also to our problems and even our values; these poems are not about rustic vacations.