Tell about the South. What's it like there. What do they do there. Why do they live there. Why do they live at all.

The quality an artist must have is objectivity in judging his work, plus the honesty and courage not to kid himself about it.

A writer is congenitally unable to tell the truth and that is why we call what he writes fiction.

Gettysburg. . . . You cant understand it. You would have to be born there.

The only environment the artist needs is whatever peace, whatever solitude, and whatever pleasure he can get at not too high a cost.

Believe that man will not merely endure; he will prevail.

I do not rewrite unless I am absolutely sure that I can express the material better if I do rewrite it.