The Novelist, afraid his ideas may be foolish, slyly puts them in the mouth of some other fool and reserves the right to disavow them.

...is this not in fact the purpose of young Americans going abroad? To make them think of things they never thought of?

Any essayist setting out on a frail apparatus of notings and jottings is a brave person.

But novels are never about what they are about; that is, there is always deeper, or more general, significance. The author may not be aware of this till she is pretty far along with it.

Glenda Adams has written a wicked and witty novel.

Statuettes of drunken sailors, velvet pictures of island maidens, plastic seashell lamps made in Taiwan. What contempt the people who think up souvenirs have for other people.

Not having to own a car has made me realize what a waste of time the automobile is.