Literature is the history of the soul.

Love and despair go hand in hand.

You need to see a bit of hell now and then. That, and great joy.

There was no one, when I was in school, who talked about going in and blowing up students. The teachers were very stern and hateable, but nobody ever mentioned murder.

I grew up when people seemed actually to be hurting themselves for their art. Of course, some of it was phony.

Children will listen to anything elders say to survive, and if you grew up without an elder telling you there was a god, what did your parents say to you?

I wouldn't buy somebody's album on a dare if they called him a musician's musician. I don't write to be a writer's writer. I don't want to be like the little-magazine writer.