The basic experience of everyone is the experience of human limitation.

The Southerner is usually tolerant of those weaknesses that proceed from innocence.

Ours is the first age in history which has asked the child what he would tolerate learning.

I don't think literature would be possible in a determined world. We might go through the motions but the heart would be out of it. Nobody could then 'smile darkly and ignore the howls.' Even if there were no Church to teach me this, writing two novels would do it. I think the more you write, the less inclined you will be to rely on theories like determinism. Mystery isn't something that is gradually evaporating. It grows along with knowledge.

Conviction without experience makes for harshness.

Faith is what someone knows to be true, whether they believe it or not.

Writing is a good example of self-abandonment. I never completely forget myself except when I am writing and I am never more completely myself than when I am writing.