The writer trusts nothing she writes-it should be too reckless and alive for that, it should be beautiful and menacing and slightly out of control. . . . Good writing . . . explodes in the reader's face. Whenever the writer writes, it's always three or four or five o'clock in the morning in her head.

Nothing we do is inevitable, but everything we do is irreversible.

Writers when they're writing live in a spooky, clamorous silence, a state somewhat like the advanced stages of prayer but without prayer's calming benefits.

As you grow older, you'll find that you enjoy talking to strangers far more than to your friends.

Good writing never soothes or comforts. It is no prescription, neither is it diversionary, although it can and should enchant while it explodes in the reader's face.

There is a certain type of conversation one hears only when one is drunk and it is like a dream, full of humor and threat and significance, deep significance.

You must stop worrying about why things happen and wonder what they mean when they do.