Any genuine work of art generates new work.

Capitalism arose and took off its pajamas. Another day, another dollar. Each man is valued at what he will bring in the marketplace. Meaning has been drained from work and assigned instead to remuneration.

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

How can you be alienated without first having been connected?

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

The writer is one who, emnbarking upon a task, does not know what to do.

--Why are we fighting them? --They're mad. We're sane. --How do we know? --That we're sane? --Yes. --Am I sane? --To all appearances. --And you, do you consider yourself sane? --I do. --Well, there you have it. --But don't they also consider themselves sane? --I think they know. Deep down. That they're not sane. --How must that make them feel? --Terrible, I should think. They must fight ever more fiercely, in order to deny what they know to be true. That they are not sane.