Writing became an obsessive compulsive habit but I had almost no money so I thought about being an urban firefighter and having lots of free time in which to write or becoming an English teacher and thinking about books and writers on a daily basis. That swayed me.

In the 18th century James Hargreaves invented the Spinning Jenny and Richard Arkwright pioneered the water-propelled spinning frame which led to the mass production of cotton. This was truly revolutionary. The cotton manufacturers created a whole new class of people - the urban proletariat. The structure of society itself would never be the same.

In the traditional urban novel there is only survival or not. The suburban idea the conformist idea that agony can be seen to and cured by doctors or psychoanalysis or self-knowledge is nowhere to be found in the city. Talking is a way of life but it is not a cure. Same with religion.

Disturbances in society are never more fearful than when those who are stirring up the trouble can use the pretext of religion to mask their true designs.

From reading over the notes for each session it was apparent that there had been improvement by more or less regular steps from almost complete terror at sight of the rabbit to a completely positive response with no signs of disturbance.

And New York is the most beautiful city in the world? It is not far from it. No urban night is like the night there... Squares after squares of flame set up and cut into the aether. Here is our poetry for we have pulled down the stars to our will.

To be misunderstood can be the writer's punishment for having disturbed the reader's peace. The greater the disturbance the greater the possibility of misunderstanding.

I don't know what it was maybe the movie theaters in my immediate surrounding neighbourhood in Burbank but I never saw what would be considered A movies.

Sydney in general is eclectic. You can be on that brilliant blue ocean walk in the morning and then within 20 minutes you can be in a completely vast suburban sprawl or an Italian or Asian suburb and it's that mix of people it's that melting pot of people that give it its vital personality.

Comrade Deng Xiaoping - along with other party elders - gave the party leadership their firm and full support to put down the political disturbance using forceful measures.

The contrasts between what is spent today to educate a child in the poorest New York City neighborhoods where teacher salaries are often even lower than the city averages and spending levels in the wealthiest suburban areas are daunting challenges to any hope New Yorkers might retain that even semblances of fairness still prevail.

Like most citizens of popular and international urban centres I don't take advantage of the cultural opportunities. Perhaps this comes from growing up in suburbia. Home is where you eat sleep read watch television and ignore your parents. It is not where you go to the ballet and then attend a heated panel discussion about it afterwards.

Many health care providers particularly physicians in rural and urban areas are leaving the Government programs because of inadequate reimbursement rates.

Urban America has been redlined. Government has not offered tax incentives for investment as it has in a dozen foreign markets. Banks have redlined it. Industries have moved out they've redlined it. Clearly to break up the redlining process there must be incentives to green-line with hedges against risk.

Blade Runner appears regularly two or three times a year in various shapes and forms of science fiction. It set the pace for what is essentially urban science fiction urban future and it's why I've never re-visited that area because I feel I've done it.

The future is going to be boring. The suburbanisation of the planet will continue and the suburbanisation of the soul will follow soon after.

I think the future of psychotherapy and psychology is in the school system. We need to teach every child how to rarely seriously disturb himself or herself and how to overcome disturbance when it occurs.

It's funny that there was so much disturbance about having a Catholic in the White House with Kennedy and when we finally get a religion in the White House that's causing a lot of conflicts and concerns and disturbances for a lot of people it's in the Bush Administration.

Urban conservationists may feel entitled to be unconcerned about food production because they are not farmers. But they can't be let off so easily for they are all farming by proxy.

I'm from a nice suburban middle-class family but my tattoos remind me where I've been.

'American Horror' is the debasement of the suburban family the way a lonely kid would have imagined it in the Seventies.

By far the most important factor in the success or failure of any school far more important than tests or standards or business-model methods of accountability is simply attracting the best-educated most exciting young people into urban schools and keeping them there.

I hate these platforms that are all over the place today they are all about grabbing attention. They are suburban! I never do a platform. Well I did in the 1970s but that was a bad experience.

There are more effective ways of tackling environmental problems including global warming proliferation of plastics urban sprawl and the loss of biodiversity than by treaties top-down regulations and other approaches offered by big governments and their dependents.