“My theory is that Kurt had a lot of residual pain from his childhood. ...” — Charles J. Shields Quote

“My theory is that Kurt had a lot of residual pain from his childhood. And when you pile that on top of his experience in World War II - he was in Dresden when it was bombed and saw a city annihilated. When you combine those two things, my impression of Kurt Vonnegut at 84 was that he was a very pained and haunted man.”

“All great works of literature either dissolve a genre or invent one.”

“Harper Lee and Truman Capote became friends as next-door neighbors in the late 1920s, when they were about kindergarten age. From the start, they recognized in each other "an apartness," as Capote later expressed it; and both loved reading. When Lee's father gave them an old Underwood typewriter, they began writing original stories together.”

“The way I like to play, it really helps when I have more people around me to combine with.”

“If you combine good flavors, food turns into an orchestra.”

“I'm always trying to find the next comedian that just gives me something a little funny to combine with all of the depressing news that I'm processing.”