The idea that the curtain rises on what is often more or less a happy scene, and it will fall just a few hours later, and everyone will be dead or have gone mad... I find that kind of narrative very appealing.

Unless you have been very, very lucky, you have undoubtedly experienced events in your life that have made you cry. So unless you have been very, very lucky, you know that a good, long session of weeping can often make you feel better, even if your circumstances have not changed one bit.

In general, of course, a stranger who tries to get you into an automobile is anything but noble, and in general a person who quotes great American novelists is anything but treacherous, and in general a man who says you needn't worry about money, or a man who smokes cigarettes, is somewhere in between.

Miracles are like pimples, because once you start looking for them you find more than you ever dreamed you'd see.

It looked exhausting and pointless, two things that should be avoided at all costs

I like writing for movies. It's nice to be alone working on fiction in your room, and then it's nice to be in a room with a bunch of people working on a movie.

We need things, and the opposite of them, and we are so rarely completely comfortable.