Writers do not merely reflect and interpret life, they inform and shape life.

In a free country it is the duty of writers to pay no attention to duty. Only under a dictatorship is literature expected to exhibit an harmonious design or an inspirational tone.

Just to live in the country is a full-time job. You don't have to do anything. The idle pursuit of making a living is pushed to one side, where it belongs, in favor of living itself, a task of such immediacy, variety, beauty, and excitement that one is powerless to resist its wild embrace.

Delay is natural to a writer. He is like a surfer-he bides his time, waits for the perfect wave on which to ride in. Delay is instinctive with him. He waits for the surge (of emotion? of strength? of courage?) that will carry him along.

Democracy is a request from a War Board, in the middle of a morning in the middle of a war, wanting to know what democracy is.

English usage is sometimes more than mere taste, judgment and education - sometimes it's sheer luck, like getting across the street.

Reading is the work of the alert mind, is demanding, and under ideal conditions produces finally a sort of ecstasy.