I started in this racket in the early '70s and when I was president of the Science Fiction Writers of America of which I was like the sixth president I was the first one nobody ever heard of.

Many writers upon the science of political economy have declared that it is the duty of a nation first to encourage the creation of wealth and second to direct and control its distribution. All such theories are delusive.

We sat around on a hotel balcony with a bottle of wine and tried to figure out how you would go about blowing up a planet. That's the kind of conversations science fiction writers have when they get together. We don't talk about football or anything like that.

It cannot be said often enough that science fiction as a genre is incredibly educational - and I'm speaking the written science fiction not 'Star Trek.' Science fiction writers tend to fill their books if they're clever with little bits of interesting stuff and real stuff.

Science fiction writers foresee the inevitable and although problems and catastrophes may be inevitable solutions are not.

I found out about reviews early on. They're mostly written by sad men on bad afternoons. That's probably why I'm less angry than some writers who are so narcissistic they consider every line of every review even a thoughtful one as major treason.

I think coldness is chic among writers and particularly ironic coldness. What is absolutely not allowable is sadness. People will do anything rather than to acknowledge that they are sad.

That is sad until one recalls how many bad books the world may yet be spared because of the busyness of writers.

Out of respect to writers you have to read the book in the way in which the author visualised it going out into the world.

I believe that like most writers my personality comes through in the fiction. So in that respect my writing can't be like any other author's really.