For a creative writer possession of the 'truth' is less important than emotional sincerity.

The fight against bad English is not frivolous.

At fifty everyone has the face he deserves.

His answer to every problem, every setback was “I will work harder!” —which he had adopted as his personal motto.

The main motive for nonattachment is a desire to escape from the pain of living, and above all from love, which, sexual or non-sexual, is hard work.

Do you begin to see, then, what kind of world we are creating? It is the exact opposite of the stupid hedonistic Utopias that the old reformers imagined. A world of fear and treachery and torment, a world of trampling and being trampled upon, a world which will grow not less but more merciless as it refines itself. Progress in our world will be progress toward more pain.

In this game that we're playing, we can't win. Some kinds of failure are better than other kinds, that's all.