What I find to be very bad advice is the snappy little sentence, 'Write what you know.' It is the most tiresome and stupid advice that could possibly be given. If we write simply about what we know we never grow. We don't develop any facility for languages, or an interest in others, or a desire to travel and explore and face experience head-on. We just coil tighter and tighter into our boring little selves. What one should write about is what interests one.

Archie was an expert at dividing the affairs of life into men's business and women's business. An empty cupboard and a full plate were the man's business, a full cupboard and an empty plate the concern of the woman.

You know, one of the tragedies of real life is that there is no background music.

... there are four women in every man’s heart. The Maid in the Meadow, the Demon Lover, the Stouthearted Woman, the Tall and Quiet Woman.

And it may be that love sometimes occurs without pain or misery.

And I think that's important, to know how the water's gone over the dam before you start to describe it. It helps to have been over the dam yourself.

Ordinary parties, he thought, were subtle games of sexual and social badminton.