If my books had been any worse, I should not have been invited to Hollywood, and if they had been any better, I should not have come.

He snorted and hit me in the solar plexus. I bent over and took hold of the room with both hands and spun it. When I had it nicely spinning I gave it a full swing and hit myself on the back of the head with the floor.

I'm killing time and it's dying hard.

Chess is as elaborate a waste of human intelligence as you can find outside an advertising agency.

If I wasn't hard, I wouldn't be alive. If I couldn't ever be gentle, I wouldn't deserve to be alive.

I think a man ought to get drunk at least twice a year just on principle, so he won't let himself get snotty about it.

It is a language which is being molded by writers to do delicate things and yet be in the grasp of superficially educated people.