The function of a writer is to make sense of life. It is such a mystery, it changes all the time, like the light.

it's impossible to conquer all fear and loss by preparation. There are always sources of desolation that aren't taken into account because no one knows what they will be.

There is no moral authority like that of sacrifice.

Writers themselves don't analyze what they do; to analyze would be to look down while crossing a canyon on a tightrope.

I don't think I am a citizen of the world; I am very much a citizen of my own country. But my own country is closely related to other parts of the world and influenced by what happens there.

The primacy of the word, basis of the human psyche, that has in our age been used for mind-bending persuasion and brain-washing pulp, disgraced by Gobbles and debased by advertising copy, remains a force for freedom that flies out between all bars.

Art defies defeat by its very existence, representing the celebration of life, in spite of all attempts to degrade and destroy it.