I can't see or feel the conflict between love and religion. To me, they're the same thing.

A novel which survives, which withstands and outlives time, does do something more than merely survive. It does not stand still. It accumulates round itself the understanding of all these persons who bring to it something of their own. It acquires associations, it becomes a form of experience in itself, so that two people who meet can often make friends, find an approach to each other, because of this one great common experience they have had.

Wariness had driven away poetry; from hesitating to feel came the moment when you no longer could.

The wish to lead out one's lover must be a tribal feeling; the wish to be seen as loved is part of one's self-respect.

The paradox of romantic love -- that what one possesses, one can no longer desire -- was at work.

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

The writer, unlike his non-writing adult friend, has no predisposed outlook; he seldom observes deliberately. He sees what he didnot intend to see; he remembers what does not seem wholly possible. Inattentive learner in the schoolroom of life, he keeps some faculty free to veer and wander. His is the roving eye.