When you write a story, you’re telling yourself the story,” he said. “When you rewrite, your main job is taking out all the things that are not the story.

If you intend to write as truthfully as you can, your days as a member of polite society are numbered.

If you write (or paint or dance or sculpt or sing, I suppose), someone will try to make you feel lousy about it, that's all.

The definition of an asshole is someone who doesn't believe what he is seeing.

No one can be as intellectually slothful as a really smart person

Bloom never pissed me off because there are critics out there, and he's one of them, who take their ignorance about popular culture as a badge of intellectual prowess.

Until we see each other again, keep your head together, read some good books, be useful, be happy.