Young girls like the excess of any quality. Without knowing, they want to suffer, to suffer they must exaggerate; they like to have loud chords struck on them.

Everything is very quiet, the streets are never crowded, and the people one dislikes are out of town.

Silences have a climax, when you have got to speak.

Makes of men date, like makes of car.

Style is the thing that's always a bit phony, and at the same time you cannot write without style.

What must novel dialogue . . . really be and do? It must be pointed, intentional, relevant. It must crystallize situation. It must express character. It must advance plot. During dialogue, the characters confront one another. The confrontation is in itself an occasion. Each one of these occasions, throughout the novel, is unique.

Often when I write I am trying to make words do the work of line and color. I have the painter's sensitivity to light. Much of my writing is verbal painting.