We are a most solitary people, and we live, repelled by one another, in the gray, outcast cities of Cain.

Man pines to live but cannot endure the days of his life.

No country has suffered so much from the ruins of war while being at peace as the American.

What has a writer to be bombastic about? Whatever good a man may write is the consequence of accident, luck, or surprise, and nobody is more surprised than an honest writer when he makes a good phrase or says something truthful.

What is most appalling in an F. Scott Fitzgerald book is that it is peopleless fiction: Fitzgerald writes about spectral, muscledsuits; dresses, hats, and sleeves which have some sort of vague, libidinous throb. These are plainly the product of sickness.

Though man is the only beast that can write, he has small reason to be proud of it. When he utters something that is wise it is nothing that the river horse does not know, and most of his creations are the result of accident.

Writing is conscience, scruple, and the farming of our ancestors.