We need more true mystery in our lives Hem- he said. The completely unambitious writer and the really good unpublished poem are the things we lack most. There is of course the problem of sustenance

Fascism is a lie told by bullies.

Fish," he said, "I love you and respect you very much. But I will kill you dead before this day ends.

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.

People who write fiction, if they had not taken it up, might have become very successful liars.

I always try to write on the principle of the iceberg. There is seven-eighths of it underwater for every part that shows.

I always like it at a war. There is always the chance that you will get up the next morning and be killed and not have to write.