What sane person could live in this world and not be crazy?

This is the treason of the artist: a refusal to admit the banality of evil and the terrible boredom of pain.

What is love of one's country; is it hate of one's uncountry? Then it's not a good thing.

Great self-destruction follows upon unfounded fear.

Great artists make the roads; good teachers and good companions can point them out. But there ain't no free rides, baby.

I believe that all novels, ... deal with character, and that it is to express character – not to preach doctrines, sing songs, or celebrate the glories of the British Empire, that the form of the novel, so clumsy, verbose, and undramatic, so rich, elastic, and alive, has been evolved ... The great novelists have brought us to see whatever they wish us to see through some character. Otherwise they would not be novelists, but poet, historians, or pamphleteers.

I have become very critical of the whole book award system and could preach on that subject for quite a while, but I do know what an award can mean to a writer early in her career. It can give an essential validation.