whatever doesn't kill you leaves scars.

There is a great deal that either has to be given up or be taken away from you if you are going to succeed in writing a body of work.

In the twentieth century, the repellent, harrowing disease that is made the index of a superior sensitivity, the vehicle of "spiritual" feelings and "critical" discontent, is insanity.

Thinking, writing are ultimately questions of stamina.

Remember when you hear yourself saying one day that you don't have time anymore to read or listen to music or look at paintings or go to the movies or do whatever feeds your head now. Then you're getting old. That means they got you, after all.

Being in love means being willing to ruin yourself for the other person.

I don't write easily or rapidly. My first draft usually has only a few elements worth keeping. I have to find what those are and build from them and throw out what doesn't work, or what simply is not alive.