Artists are never complete people. But if it's art that completes them, then what is taken away?

The man who has faith in logic is always cuckolded by reality.

Where there is no style, there is in effect no point of view. There is, essentially, no anger, no conviction, no self. Style is opinion, hung washing, the caliber of a bullet, teething beads.

Book-publishing is all about politics. Agents, editors, which books will be puffed, which ignored, etc.

Faculty Meetings are held whenever the need to show off is combined with the imperative of accomplishing nothing.

The parrot holds its food for prim consumption as daintily as any debutante, [with] a predilection for pot roast, hashed-brown potatoes, duck skin, butter, hoisin sauce, sesame seed oil, bananas and human thumb.

Ordinary persons, he said, smiling, found no differences between men. The artist found them all.