We are what we have been told about ourselves. We are the sum of the messages we have received. The true messages. The false messages.

Art is not difficult because it wishes to be difficult, but because it wishes to be art.

See the moon? It hates us.

Is death that which gives meaning to life?

Maybe writing can't be taught, but editing can be taught—prayer, fasting and self-mutilation.

I believe that because I had obtained a wife who was made up of wife-signs (beauty, charm, softness, perfume, cookery) I had found love.

My mother studied English and drama at the University of Pennsylvania, where my father studied architecture. She was a great influence in all sorts of ways, a wicked wit.