The State, that cawing rookery of committees and subcommittees.

All writers - all people - have their stores of private and family legends which lie like a collection of half-forgotten, often violent toys on the floor of memory.

The mark of genius is an incessant activity of mind. Genius is a spiritual greed.

Because of the influence of the cinema, most reports or stories of violence are so pictorial that they lack content or meaning. The camera brings them to our eyes, but does not settle them in our minds, nor in time.

It is exciting and emancipating to believe we are one of nature's latest experiments, but what if the experiment is unsuccessful?

One recalls how much the creative impulse of the best-sellers depends upon self-pity. It is an emotion of great dramatic potential.

Like many popular best-sellers, he was a very sad and solemn man who took himself too seriously and his art not seriously enough.