There is a certain solipsism to serious illness which claims all of one's attention as certainly as an astronomical black hole seizes anything unlucky enough to fall within its critical radius.

Context is to data what water is to a dolphin

Most of us do know we have no immortality. And when you've found a genius, someone who has already purchased his immortality in musical or literary terms, it's maddening.

The problem with being passionately in love ... is that it deprives you of too much sleep.

I loved you backward and forward in time. I loved you beyond boundaries of time and space.

The never-ending competition between writers hasn't changed between 1868 and 2000. I used to belong to writers' workshops with other professionals, but that becomes impossible after a while. Everyone's on a different step of the career ladder. Jealousy doesn't have to erupt into murder and burying someone in Wells Cathedral, but it is always there.

This is every writer's nightmare - the sudden breakdown of meaning in the language that sustains and supports us.