every short story is an experiment - what one must ask is not only, did it come off, but was it, as an experiment, worth making?

With three or more people there is something bold in the air: direct things get said which would frighten two people alone and conscious of each inch of their nearness to one another. To be three is to be in public - you feel safe.

When you love someone all your saved up wishes start coming out.

Silences can be as different as sounds.

Nothing, that is say no one, can be such an inexorable tour-conductor as one's own conscience or sense of duty, if one allows either the upper hand: the self-bullying that goes on in the name of sight-seeing is grievous.

Dialogue should convey a sense of spontaneity but eliminate the repetitiveness of real talk.

We desert those who desert us; we cannot afford to suffer; we must live how we can.