Fiction to me is a kind of parable. You have got to make up your mind it's not true. Some kind of truth emerges from it, but it's not fact.

If you want to concentrate deeply on some problem, and especially some piece of writing or paper-work, you should acquire a cat . . .

If you choose the sort of life which has no conventional pattern you have to try to make an art of it, or it is a mess.

You look for one thing and you find another.

So great was the noise during the day that I used to lie awake at night listening to silence.

One should only see a psychiatrist out of boredom.

Beware of men bearing flowers.