The unconscious mind has a habit of asserting itself in the afternoon.

There is, in fact, not much point in writing a novel unless you can show the possibility of moral transformation, or an increase in wisdom, operating in your chief character or characters. Even trashy bestsellers show people changing. When a fictional work fails to show change, when it merely indicates that human character is set, stony, unregenerable, then you are out of field of the novel and into that of the fable or the allegory. - from the introduction of the 1986 Norton edition

It had been a wonderful evening and what I needed now, to give it the perfect ending, was a little of the Ludwig Van.

Alex like groweth up, Oh Yes.

Art is rare and sacred and hard work, and there ought to be a wall of fire around it.

The writer's life seethes within but not without.

Life's only choosing when to die. Life's a big postponement because the choice is so difficult. It's a tremendous relief not to have to choose.