A book, a true book, is the writer's confessional. For, whether he would have it so or not, he is betrayed, directly or indirectly, by his characters, into presenting publicly his innermost feelings.

Yet once you've come to be part of this particular patch, you'll never love another. Like loving a woman with a broken nose, you may well find lovelier lovelies. But never a lovely so real.

And money can't buy everything. For example: poverty.

... Chicago divided your heart. Leaving you loving the joint for keeps. Yet knowing it never can love you.

There's people in hell who want ice water.

One of the best things Henry Miller ever said was that art goes all out. It's all out. It goes full length. . . . A big book is an all-out book in which you limit your life to things that pertain directly to the book.

The only way I could finish a book and get a plot was just to keep making it longer until something happens.