I taught writing for a while and whenever somebody would tell me they were going to write about their dad, I would tell them they might as well go write about killing puppies because neither story was going to work. It just doesn't work.

That's the secret of how to enjoy writing and how to make yourself meet high standards," said Mrs. Berman. "You don't write for the whole world, and you don't write for ten people, or two. You write for just one person.

It was a thunderingly beautiful experience-voluptuous, sexual, dangerous, and expensive as hell.

Scientific truth was going to make us so happy and comfortable. What actually happened when I was twenty-one was that we dropped scientific truth on Hiroshima.

A man without a home can't be lost.

If you can do no good, at least do no harm.

True terror is to wake up one morning and discover that your high school class is running the country.