In the greatest fiction, the writer's moral sense coincides with his dramatic sense, and I see no way for it to do this unless his moral judgement is part of the very act of seeing, and he is free to use it. I have heard it said that belief in Christian dogma is a hindrance to the writer, but I myself have found nothing further from the truth. Actually, it frees the storyteller to observe. It is not a set of rules which fixes what he sees in the world. It affects his writing primarily by guaranteeing his respect for mystery.

To the hard of hearing you shout, and for the almost blind you draw large and startling figures.

You have to quit confusing a madness with a mission.

So many people can now write competent stories that the short story is in danger of dying of competence.

Faith has to take in all the other possibilities it can.

People without hope not only don't write novels, but what is more to the point, they don't read them.

Anyone who survives a southern childhood has enough material to last a lifetime.