That would be the death of anyone - to recognize false hopes with a certainty. One mustn't know that. If it is offered, refuse!

Clarity is the most important thing to me - in thinking - and so I try in the books to be as clear as possible.

I'm confused, and brilliant books help me to be less so.

I'm an elephant today. I will need to have lots of room and also a bowl of water on the floor.

Not that believing such things has anything to do with whether they are true. You see that, don't you?

The old man began to sing. His voice was very lovely and obviously a part of something that the world had disposed of in its haste, evidence of a grander, kinder past.

I have a very basic notion of the structure the book might have - that's mostly it. The rest is luck and happenstance.