You are wrong if you think that you can in any way take the vision and tame it... The vision is not so much destroyed, exactly, as it is, by the time you have finished, forgotten. It has been replaced by this changeling.

On plenty of days the writer can write three or four pages, and on plenty of other days he concludes he must throw them away.

Admire the world for never ending on you -- as you would an opponent, without taking your eyes away from him, or walking away.

When I first read the words 'introvert' and 'extrovert' when I was 10, I thought I was both.

The extravagant gesture is the very stuff of creation.

The sea pronounces something, over and over, in a hoarse whisper; I cannot quite make it out.

Your freedom as a writer is not freedom of expression in the sense of wild blurting; you may not let rip. It is life at its most free, if you are fortunate enough to be able to try it, because you select your materials, invent your task, and pace yourself.