Most people go through life using up half their energy trying to protect a dignity they never had

An age which is incapable of poetry is incapable of any kind of literature except the cleverness of a decadence.

The dilemma of the critic has always been that if he knows enough to speak with authority, he knows too much to speak with detachment.

All language begins with speech, and the speech of common men at that, but when it develops to the point of becoming a literary medium it only looks like speech.

The more you reason the less you create.

Down these mean streets a man must go who is neither tarnished nor afraid

You can always tell a detective on TV. He never takes his hat off.