There are two kinds of brave men: those who are brave by the grace of nature, and those who are brave by an act of will.

What's the use of being a writer if you can't irritate a great many people?

Somerset Maugham ... wrote somewhere that "Nobody is any better than he ought to be."... I carried it along with me as a working philosophy, but I suppose that finally I would have to take exception to the thought ... or else the universe is just an elaborate clock.

We are all so guilty at the way we have allowed the world around us to become more ugly and tasteless every year that we surrender to terror and steep ourselves in it.

Over the years, I've found one rule. It is the only one I give on those occasions when I talk about writing. A simple rule. If you tell yourself you are going to be at your desk tomorrow, you are by that declaration asking your unconscious to prepare the material. You are, in effect, contracting to pick up such valuables at a given time. Count on me, you are saying to a few forces below: I will be there to write.

There's nothing glorious about being a professional. . . . Professionalism probably comes down to being able to work on a bad day.

The function of socialism is to raise suffering to a higher level.