At one time I thought the most important thing was talent. I think now that the young man must possess or teach himself, training himself, in infinite patience, which is to try and to try until it comes right. He must train himself in ruthless intolerance-that is to throw away anything that is false no matter how much he might love that page or that paragraph. The most important thing is insight, that is to be-curiosity-to wonder, to mull, and to muse why it is that man does what he does, and if you have that, then I don't think the talent makes much difference, whether you've got it or not.

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

It is my ambition to be, as a private individual, abolished and voided from history, leaving it markless.

any live man is better than any dead man but no live or dead man is very much better than any other live or dead man

How often have I lain beneath rain on a strange roof, thinking of home.

How do our lives ravel out into the no-wind, no-sound, the weary gestures wearily recapitulant: echoes of old compulsions with no-hand on no-string: in sunset we fall into furious attitudes, dead gestures of dolls.

Love doesn't die; the men and women do.