My body is no schoolboy.

I don't believe in anything, Mother," I said. "You told Armand long ago that you believe you'll find answers in the great jungles and forests; that the stars will finally reveal a vast truth. But I don't believe in anything. And that makes me stronger than you think

We need to stop fighting Christian against Christian. I have no time for anything but trying to love other people. That is a full-time job.

And books, they offer one hope -- that a whole universe might open up from between the covers, and falling into that universe, one is saved.

The library furnished our dreams, helped us shape our ambitions, made up people of books and ideas and grand designs.

Go where the pleasure is in your writing. Go where the pain is. Write the book you would like to read. Write the book you have been trying to find but have not found. But write. And remember, there are no rules for our profession. Ignore rules. Ignore what I say here if it doesn't help you. Do it your own way. Every writer knows fear and discouragement. Just write.The world is crying for new writing. It is crying for fresh and original voices and new characters and new stories. If you won't write the classics of tomorrow, well, we will not have any.

I think that we are supernatural. We are unique. We're the only animals in the universe that we know of that actually have self-consciousness, a sense of time and our own mortality.