Nothing has a more sinister effect on art than the artist's desire to prove that he's good. The terrible temptation of idealism! You must achieve mastery over your idealism, over your virtue as well as over your vice, aesthetic mastery over everything that drives you to write in the first place - your outrage, your politics, your grief, your love!

Obviously the facts are never just coming at you but are incorporated by an imagination that is formed by your previous experience. Memories of the past are not memories of facts but memories of your imaginings of the facts.

Memories of the past are not memories of facts but memories of your imaginings of the facts.

Literature got me into this mess and literature is going to have to get me out of it.

For a pure sense of being tumultuously alive, you can't beat the nasty side of existence.

There are no uncontaminated angels

Nothing lasts and yet nothing passes either, and nothing passes just because nothing lasts.