Being famous as a writer is like being famous in a village. It's not really any very heady fame.

My greatest pleasure is to invent. My continual mad ambition is to make something true and beautiful that never existed in the world before.

(From the story The Last Days of a Famous Mime) He said nothing. He was mildly annoyed at her presumption: that he had not thought this many, many times before. With perfect misunderstanding she interpreted his passivity as disdain. Wishing to hurt him, she slapped his face. Wishing to hurt her, he smiled brilliantly.

It's like standing on the edge of a cliff. This is especially true of the first draft. Every day you're making up the earth you're going to stand on.

All our heroes, all our great stories are about failure.

People do not love those whose eyes show that they are somewhere else

I did not know that history is like a blood stain that keeps on showing on the wall no matter how many new owners take possession, no matter how many times we pint over it.