Some other places were not so good but maybe we were not so good when we were in them.

The first and most important thing of all, at least for writers today, is to strip language clean, to lay it bare down to the bone.

How little we know of what there is to know.

I would stand and look out over the roofs of Paris and think, "Do not worry. You have always written before and you will write now. All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.

I'm tired of everybody. Please forgive me.

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

You must be prepared to work always without applause.