Real seriousness in regard to writing being one of the two absolute necessities. The other, unfortunately, is talent.

Courage is grace under pressure.

You're an expatriate. You've lost touch with the soil. You get precious. Fake European standards have ruined you. You drink yourself to death. You become obsessed by sex. You spend all your time talking, not working. You are an expatriate, see? You hang around cafTs.

How little we know of what there is to know.

You may talk. And I may listen. And miracles might happen.

There are only three sports: bullfighting, motor racing, and mountaineering; all the rest are merely games.

I kept this to remind me of you trying to brush away the Villa Rossa from your teeth in the morning, swearing and eating aspirin and cursing harlots. Every time I see that glass I think of you trying to clean your conscience with a toothbrush.