What do I believe in? Belief means faith, and there's only one damned thing in the world I have any faith in. That's the idea of American democracy, because it seems to me so obvious that that's the only sensible way to run human affairs.

You can't dance cheerfully. Dancing is too important. It can be wild or solemn or gay or lewd or art for art's sake, but it can't be cheerful.

A man may debar nonsense from his library of reason, but not from the arena of his impulses.

War doesn't mature men; it merely pickles them in the brine of disgust and dread.

I'm not a collector. I don't keep letters, or books, or souvenirs. But I do keep one copy of each translation of my books into a foreign language. Have you ever seen a murder story printed in Singhalese? Wow!

Everyone has something they don't want anyone to see; that is one of the functions of a home, to provide a spot to keep such things.

Subtlety chases the obvious up a never-ending spiral and never quite catches it.