It is as hard to find a neutral critic as it is a neutral country in time of war. I suppose if a critic were neutral, he wouldn't trouble to write anything.

words can never get at the truth.

You do not create a style. You work, and develop yourself; your style is an emanation from your own being.

First impressions are often signals from the deep that we should credit oftener than we do.

Two-thirds of my energies go in trying to save one-third for work.

I have a great deal of religious symbolism in my stories because I have a very deep sense of religion and also I have a religious training. And I suppose you don't say, `I'm going to have the flowering judas tree stand for betrayal,' but of course it does.

I was right not to be afraid of any thief but myself, who will end by leaving me nothing.