Only amateurs say that they write for their own amusement. Writing is not an amusing occupation. It is a combination of ditch-digging, mountain-climbing, treadmill and childbirth. Writing may be interesting, absorbing, exhilarating, racking, relieving. But amusing? Never!

Writing, to be memorable, must be done in a state of impassioned serenity.

Living the past is a dull and lonely business; looking back strains the neck muscles, causing you to bump into people not going your way.

There are only two kinds of people in the world that really count. One kind's wheat and the other kind's emeralds.

A stricken tree, a living thing, so beautiful, so dignified, so admirable in its potential longevity, is, next to man, perhaps the most touching of wounded objects.

writers of novels are so busy being solitary that they haven't time to meet one another. But then, a writer learns nothing from a writer, conversationally. If a writer has anything witty, profound or quotable to say he doesn't say it. He's no fool. He writes it.

Being an old maid is like death by drowning, a really delightful sensation after you cease to struggle.