Fish," the old man said. "Fish, you are going to have to die anyway. Do you have to kill me too?

Once writing has become your major vice and greatest pleasure only death can stop it.

There are many good fishermen and some great ones. But there is only one you.

Try to learn to breathe deeply, really to taste food when you eat, and when you sleep, really to sleep. Try as much as possible to be wholly alive with all your might, and when you laugh, laugh like hell. And when you get angry, get good and angry. Try to be alive. You will be dead soon enough.

Everyone my age had written a novel and I was still having difficulty writing a paragraph.

If you stop complaining and asking for what you never will get, you will have a good life. A good life is not measured by any biblical span.

I drink to make other people more interesting.