Summer is a discouraging time to work - you don't feel death coming on the way it does in the fall when the boys really put pen to paper.

I mistrust all frank and simple people, especially when their stories hold together

Imagination? It is the one thing beside honesty that a good writer must have. The more he learns from experience the more he can imagine.

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

The thing is to become a master and in your old age to acquire the courage to do what children did when they knew nothing.

Defense is the stronger form with the negative object, and attack the weaker form with the positive object.

The telephone and visitors are the work destroyers.