To any writer: Teach yourself to work in uncertainty. Many writers are anxious when they begin, or try something new. Even Matisse painted some of his Fauvist pictures in anxiety. Maybe that helped him to simplify. Character, discipline, negative capability count. Write, complete, revise. If it doesn't work, begin something else.

It was all those biographies in me yelling, 'We want out. We want to tell you what we've done to you.'

The short story packs a self in a few pages predicating a lifetime

For misery don't blame God. He gives the food but we cook it.

A man has to construct, invent, his freedom.

We have two lives, the life we learn with and the life we live with after that. Suffering is what brings us toward happiness.

We didn't starve but nobody ate chicken unless we were sick or the chicken was.