Honestly, I haven't the time to read contemporary writers. I know this is awful, but in the main it is true.
You'll get back to where you came from.
The greatest pleasure is not - say - sex or geometry. It is just understanding. And if you can get people to understand their own humanity - well, that's the job of the writer.
Nothing is so impenetrable as laughter in a language you don't understand.
Worse than madness. Sanity.
But forgiveness must not only be given but received also.