We live in time, it bounds us and defines us, and time is supposed to measure history, isn't it? But if we can't understand time, can't grasp its mysteries of pace and progress, what chance do we have with history--even our own small, personal, largely undocumented piece of it?

I thought of the things that had happened to me over the years, and of how little I had made happen.

I'm one of those writers who started off writing novels and came to writing short stories later, partly because I didn't have the right ideas, partly because I think that short stories are more difficult. I think learning to write short stories also made me attracted toward a paring down of the novel form.

This was another of our fears: that Life wouldn't turn out to be like Literature.

If you’re that clever you can argue yourself into anything.

But life never lets you go, does it? You can't put down life the way you put down a book.

If a man cannot tell what he wants to do, then he must find out what he ought to do. If desire has become complicated, then hold fast to duty.