Only mediocrity escapes criticism.

I know this... a man got to do what he got to do.

Not only do the brave get killed, but the brave have a better chance of it.

A man so painfully in love is capable of self-torture beyond belief.

It’s all fine to say, “Time will heal everything, this too shall pass away. People will forget”—and things like that when you are not involved, but when you are there is no passage of time, people do not forget and you are in the middle of something that does not change.

A writer out of loneliness is trying to communicate like a distant star sending signals. He isn't telling or teaching or ordering. Rather he seeks to establish a relationship of meaning, of feeling, of observing. We are lonesome animals. We spend all life trying to be less lonesome.

And, of course, people are interested only in themselves. If a story is not about the hearer he will not listen.