Now and then I become conscious of having the reputation of being one of the great drinkers, if not one of the great drunks, of our time.

Sex is a momentary itch, love never lets you go.

Yevgeny Yevtushenko: 'You atheist?' "Kingsley Amis: 'Well, yes, but it's more that I hate him.

A bad review may spoil your breakfast, but you shouldn't allow it to spoil your lunch.

Jake was close to tears. In that moment he saw the world in its true light, as a place where nothing had ever been any good and nothing of significance done: no art worth a second look, no philosophy of the slightest appositeness, no law but served the state, no history that gave an inkling of how it had been and what had happened. And no love, only egotism, infatuation and lust.

He who truly believes he has a hangover has no hangover.

Your attitude measures up to the two requirements of love. You want to go to bed with her and can't, and you don't know her very well. Ignorance of the other person topped up with deprivation, Jim. You fit the formula all right, and what's more you want to go on fitting it.