There is no moment that exceeds in beauty that moment when one looks at a woman and finds that she is looking at you in the same way that you are looking at her. The moment in which she bestows that look that says, "Proceed with your evil plan, sumbitch.

Painters, especially American painters since the Second World War, have been much more troubled, beset by formal perplexity, than American writers. Theyve been a laboratory for everybody.

I don’t think you can talk about progress in art—movement, but not progress.

Is death that which gives meaning to life?

The self cannot be escaped, but it can be, with ingenuity and hard work, distracted.

Well chaps first I'd like to say a few vile things more or less at random, not only because it is expected of me but also because I enjoy it.

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