Delete nothing. Move nothing. Change nothing. Learn everything.

I'm your nightmare. Did you think you were done with nightmares, now you've become one?

In the Netherlands I read the first chapter of Exquisite Corpse to an audience that laughed in all the places I thought were funny - an experience I've never had in America!

Mostly I enjoy the restaurants (my husband is a chef), though I wish we had a wider diversity of ethnic food.

The sky is purple, the flare of a match behind a cupped hand is gold; the liquor is green, bright green, made from a thousand herbs, made from altars. Those who know enough to drink Chartreuse at Mardi Gras are lucky, because the distilled essence of the town burns in their bellies. Chartreuse glows in the dark, and if you drink enough of it, your eyes will turn bright green.

It was like discovering that your innermost fires and terrors, the things you believed no one else could fathom, were in fact the basis of a recognized philosophy. Some part of you felt intimately invaded, threatened; some other part fell to its knees and sobbed in gratitude that it was no longer alone.

I believe in whatever gets you throught the night. [...] Night is the hardest time to be alive. For me, anyway. It lasts so long, and four A.M.knows all my secrets.