The less there was to see, the harder he looked, the more he saw. (Point Omega)

Writers, some of us, may tend to see things before other people do, things that are right there but aren't noticed in the way that a writer might notice.

People say great art is immortal. I say there's something mortal in it. It carries a glimpse of death.

That's how you write novels actually. You suddenly hit upon something and you realize this is the path you were meant to take. You'd be a fool if you didn't follow it. Perhaps it's like solving a difficult question in pure mathematics. There must be a moment when the solution is so simple and evident that you wonder why you hadn't come upon it before. When you do come upon it, you know it in the deepest part of your being. It carries its own logic.

It was only after two years' work that it occurred to me that I was a writer. I had no particular expectation that the novel would ever be published, because it was sort of a mess. It was only when I found myself writing things I didn't realise I knew that I said, 'I'm a writer now.' The novel had become an incentive to deeper thinking. That's really what writing is—an intense form of thought.

Insanity's so personal. It's hard to know who shares our secrets.

Only a catastrophe gets our attention. We want them, we depend on them. As long as they happen somewhere else.