Keep right on lying to me. That's what I want you to do.

Organizations for writers palliate the writer's loneliness, but I doubt if they improve his writing.... For he does his work alone and if he is a good enough writer he must face eternity, or the lack of it, each day.

If you're looking for messages, try Western Union.

After writing a story I was always empty and both sad and happy, as though I had made love.

There is a mystery in all great writing and that mystery does not dissect out. It continues and is always valid.

There are only two places in the world where we can live happy: at home and in Paris.

Now a writer can make himself a nice career while he is alive by espousing a political cause, working for it, making a profession of believing in it, and if it wins he will be very well placed. All politics is a matter of working hard without reward, or with a living wage for a time, in the hope of booty later. A man can be a Fascist or a Communist and if his outfit gets in he can get to be an ambassador or have a million copies of his books printed by the Government or any of the other rewards the boys dream about.