I do not much care for nature, and believe that flowers belong in vases rather than loose and untidy on the ground.

Astronauts: rotarians in outer space.

Great critics do not explicate a text; they describe it and then report on what they have described, if the description itself is not the criticism.

I have been saying for the some time now that America has only one party - the property party. It's the party of big corporation, the party of money. It has two right wings; one is Democrat and the other is Republican.

What we are is seldom what we want to be, while what we want to be is either denied us or changes with the seasons.

Constant work, constant writing and constant revision. The real writer learns nothing from life. He is more like an oyster or a sponge. What he takes in he takes in normally the way any person takes in experience. But it is what is done with it in his mind, if he is a real writer, that makes his art.

We are given our place in time as we are given our eyes: weak, strong, clear, squinting, the thing is not ours to choose. Well, this has been a squinting, walleyed time to be born in.