What's genius? I don't know but I do know that the difference between a madman and a professional is that a pro does as well as he can within what he has set out to do and a madman does exceptionally well at what he can't help doing.

I could read the great books but the great books don't interest me.

I could see the road ahead of me. I was poor and I was going to stay poor. But I didn't particularly want money. I didn't know what I wanted. Yes, I did. I wanted someplace to hide out, someplace where one didn't have to do anything. The thought of being something didn't only appall me, it sickened me . . . To do things, to be part of family picnics, Christmas, the 4th of July, Labor Day, Mother's Day . . . was a man born just to endure those things and then die? I would rather be a dishwasher, return alone to a tiny room and drink myself to sleep.

I knew exactly what I was doing: I was doing nothing. because I knew there was nothing to do.

If you can only remain pure in your stupidity, someday you may get a phone call from hell.

but as God said, crossing his legs, I see where I have made plenty of poets but not so very much poetry.

Most people's deaths are a sham. There's nothing left to die.