Revision is one of the exquisite pleasures of writing.

There is in the darkness a unity, if you will, that cannot be achieved in any other environment, a blending of self with what the self perceives, and exquisite mystical experience.

If the stories come, you get them written, you're on the right track. Eventually everyone learns his or her own best way. The real mystery to crack is you.

The great thing about writing: Stay with it ... ultimately you teach yourself something very important about yourself.

We can't all be friends and relatives as the world is; most of us have to be strangers.

What suffering has taught me is the uselessness of suffering.

Writers who can't invent stories often substitute style for narrative. They remind me of the painter who couldn't paint people, so he painted chairs.