writers are makers, not just transmitters, of myths. Literature offers not only myths but counter-myths, just as life offers counter-experiences - experiences that confound what you thought you thought, or felt, or believed.

Perversity is the muse of modern literature.

I perceive value, I confer value, I create value, I even create — or guarantee — existence. Hence, my compulsion to make “lists.” The things (Beethoven’s music, movies, business firms) won’t exist unless I signify my interest in them by at least noting down their names. Nothing exists unless I maintain it (by my interest, or my potential interest). This is an ultimate, mostly subliminal anxiety. Hence, I must remain always, both in principle + actively, interested in everything. Taking all of knowledge as my province.

Existence is no more than the precarious attainment of relevance in an intensely mobile flux of past, present, and future.

The decline of education in North America and I suppose in Western Europe makes it harder to have a common body of references.

Marriage is a sort of tacit hunting in couples.

The possession of a camera can inspire something akin to lust. And like all credible forms of lust, it cannot be satisfied.