The greatest threat to mankind comes from the renunciation of individual scruple in favor of institutional denominators. . . . Real heroism lies, as it always will, not in conformity or even patriotism, but in acts of solitary moral courage. Which, come to think of it, is what we used to admire in our Christian savior

The cat sat on the mat is not a story. The cat sat on the other cat’s mat is a story.

You have no idea how humiliating it was, as a boy, to suddenly have all your clothes, your toys, snatched by the bailiff. I mean we were a middle-class family, it's not as if it was happening up and down the street. It made me ashamed, I felt dirty.

I've got more than one string to my bow, and I thought I'd give this one a twang.

Thank heaven, though, one of the few mistakes I haven't made is to talk about the unwritten book.

I think that all writers feel alienated. ... I know that I do. ... I still feel, as I think most creative people do, absolutely isolated.

There are some subjects that can only be tackled in fiction.