Somebody has to keep score and I decided I was going to do it. I'm a born score-keeper and I realize, like an umpire, that my decisions may cause distress.

What matters finally is not the world's judgment of oneself but one's own judgment of the world.... Any writer who lacks this final arrogance will not survive very long in America.

People like to re-invent you, according to cliché. There are a lot of stores about me that really apply only to Capote or Mailer or somebody else. Everything is a mish mash.

Then die. We must all do that. But die, as they say, game.

You hear all this whining going on, "Where are our great writers?" The thing I might feel doleful about is: Where are the readers?

I never reread a text until I have finished the first draft. Otherwise it's too discouraging.

Some writers take to drink, others take to audiences.