Like most of the educated, I do harbor a fondness for the sins of my ignorant past.

Most of my childhood revolved around wondering when we would be blown up by the Russians. I couldn't stand the news, I knew that if the missile were launched, mortality would arrive in half an hour, so I spent a lot of my childhood feeling that I was 30 minutes from being dead.

Good intentions are wicked! As far as I can see, all they lead to are lies and delusions.

One of the things that Ivar knew about Mrs. Walker was that she would only tell him what she knew if he asked the right question, so he spent a portion of his time meditating over what he might ask Mrs. Walker and how he might phrase the question.

My characters never die screaming in rage. They attempt to pull themselves back together and go on. And that's basically a conservative view of life.

There can never be such a thing as a free market, because it is human nature to cheat, monopolize, and buy off others so as to corner the market.

Some novelists are luckier than others in the eras of their formative intellectual years, but all Weltanschauungs return, which means that most novelists have at least a chance of a revival.