When I was young, I admired clever people. Now that I am old, I admire kind people.
I wish I were one of those terribly clever people who, when they write their autobiographies, always say, when I was fifteen months old I distinctly remember my Aunt Fanny saying to me, etc.
Clever people master life; the wise illuminate it and create fresh difficulties.
Honestly, I just assume that whatever is going to happen to me is going to happen. There it goes: someone is there, someone isn't there. This girl is here. This food is here. I think the clever people are the ones who do a little as possible.
I've driven all through America and I know there are a lot of clever people between the coasts. But they have a slightly old-fashioned view of the world. Whereas New York is one of the most multicultural, multiracial, tolerant places on Earth.
Clever people seem not to feel the natural pleasure of bewilderment, and are always answering questions when the chief relish of a life is to go on asking them.
I think clever people think that poor people are stupid.
The really clever people now want to be lawyers or journalists.
I am trying to write novels for properly clever people, but I also want them to be proper novels that also stick in a person's mind and have an atmosphere about them.
I think there is a basic comfort in clever people who know things.