There are some books that refuse to be written. They stand their ground year after year and will not be persuaded. It isn't because the book is not there and worth being written -- it is only because the right form of the story does not present itself. There is only one right form for a story and if you fail to find that form the story will not tell itself.

There are basically two types of people. People who accomplish things, and people who claim to have accomplished things. The first group is less crowded.

I came in with Halley's Comet in 1835. It is coming again next year, and I expect to go out with it. It will be the greatest disappointment of my life if I don't go out with Halley's Comet. The Almighty has said, no doubt: "Now here are these two unaccountable freaks; they came in together, they must go out together.

I simply can't resist a cat, particularly a purring one.

A discriminating irreverence is the creator and protector of human liberty.

Conservatism is the blind and fear-filled worship of dead radicals.

The critic's symbol should be the tumble-bug: he deposits his egg in somebody else's dung, otherwise he could not hatch it.