Suppose you meet me in the woods.

Integrity can be neither lost nor concealed nor faked nor quenched nor artificially come by nor outlived, nor, I believe, in the long run, denied.

I believe in it, and I trust it too and treasure it above everything, the personal, the personal, the personal! I put my faith in it not only as the source, the ground of meaning in art, in life, but as the meaning itself.

How can you go out on a limb if you do not know your own tree? No art ever came out of not risking your neck. And risk--experiment--is a considerable part of the joy of doing.

The mystery in how little we know of other people is no greater than the mystery of how much, Laurel thought.

What we know about writing the novel is the novel.

To write honestly and with all our powers is the least we can do, and the most.