Writing, for me, is a search for God.

The trouble with me is that for a long time I have just been an I person. All people belong to a We except me. Not to belong to a We makes you too lonesome.

Wherever you look there’s meanness and corruption. This room, this bottle of grape wine, these fruits in the basket, are all products of profit and loss. A fellow can’t live without giving his passive acceptance to meanness. Somebody wears his tail to a frazzle for every mouthful we eat and every stitch we wear—and nobody seems to know. Everybody is blind, dumb, and blunt-headed—stupid and mean.

How can the dead be truly dead when they still live in the souls of those who are left behind?

There is no stillness like the quiet of the first cold nights in the fall.

Resentment is the most precious flower of poverty.

The world is certainty a sudden place.