Writer’s block is only a failure of the ego.

Part of the oncoming demise (of New York during its terrible fiscal crisis) is that none of us can simply believe it. We were always the best and the strongest of cities, and our people were vital to the teeth. Knock them down eight times and they would get up with that look in the eye which suggests the fight has barely begun.

...never have I subscribed to the doctrine of willful rejection of the world or its visual image. To the non-objectivist this act of impiety may be shockingly impure, but God, I have no desire to be either hollow or sterile.

A really good style comes only when a man has become as good as he can be. Style is character. A good style cannot come from a bad undisciplined character.

...the indispensable requirement for a good newspaperman - as eager to tell a lie as the truth.

The final purpose of art is to intensify, even, if necessary, to exacerbate, the moral consciousness of people.

The night before I left Las Vegas I walked out in the desert to look at the moon. There was a jeweled city on the horizon, spires rising in the night, but the jewels were diadems of electric and the spires were the neon of signs ten stories high.