One must have the humility and the imagination to honor all deep human experiences - not least those one has never come near to sharing.

It's the thought that counts.

when two people unite, kindness must be mutual, or shocking things will happen.

But poetry is not to be lived, except for the few to whom it is more important than self-preservation.

anything that becomes a cult, or a mass movement, loses its moral and spiritual value. The crusade has to be personal, individual. As soon as it becomes collective it loses its purpose.

The novel will never die, but it will keep changing and evolving and taking different shapes.

[On Ian Fleming:] The trouble with Ian is that he gets off with women because he can't get on with them.