And I finished college because I thought how much it would upset my parents if I didnt.

It’s true, I had an extremely delicious life, but that was my life at home, and perhaps because I was only a child, or for whatever reasons, I found the company of others, especially other boys, quite terrifying and upsetting.

Write about the things that attract you. Choose your subjects the way you used to choose your toys: out of desire.

After the navy, I transferred to Harvard and finished there. I was there the spring term of 1951 and I stayed through the summer term and a whole other year, so I was able to do two years in a little less than a year and a half.

What I said about John was that he liberated me from my anxieties about writing in a correct, acceptable way.

There are many things I’ve written that I didn’t really understand until a long time later.

Music had been my first love among the arts, and I was fascinated by it, as I still am.