The downtrodden are the great creators of slang.

We can destroy what we have written, but we cannot unwrite it.

I don't write out of fear. I write out of a strong urge to meet death on its own eternal terms, because the fact is that if you write as little as a page of prose-even bad prose-that is eternal.

A Haydn symphony had a meaning for the social group that listened to it. A Mahler symphony had a meaning for the man who composed it. Here is the difference between the classical and romantic attitudes to art.

I wrote much because I was paid little. I had no great desire to leave a literary name behind me.

I mean, there's little enough in this life, really, and you only find it worth living for the odd moments, and if you think you're going to have those odd moments again, then it makes life wonderful and have a meaning.

Laugh and the world laughs with you, snore and you sleep alone.