The privileged classes can afford psychoanalysis and whiskey. Whereas all we get is sermons and sour wine. This is manifestly unfair. I protest, silently.

The important thing is the educational experience itself — how to survive it.

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

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.

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

Yes, success is everything. Failure is more common. Most achieve a sort of middling thing, but fortunately one's situation is always blurred, you never know absolutely quite where you are.

Is death that which gives meaning to life?