There are few things more subtly distressing than an inappropriate gift from someone close to you.

There are few things more subtly distressing than an inappropriate gift from someone close to you.

The moment a book is lent I begin to miss it.

Rome was a poem pressed into service as a city.

There was a time when we expected nothing of our children but obedience, as opposed to the present, when we expect everything of them but obedience.

The tension between 'yes' and no', between 'I can' and 'I cannot,' makes us feel that, in so many instances, human life is an interminable debate with one's self.

To choose a writer for a friend is like palling around with your cardiologist, who might be musing as you talk to him that you are a sinking man. A writer's love for another writer is never quite free of malice. He may enjoy discussing your failures even more than you do. He probably sees you as tragic, like his characters - or unworthy of tragedy, which is worse.