This is a war universe. War all the time. That is its nature. There may be other universes based on all sorts of other principles, but ours seems to be based on war and games. All games are basically hostile. Winners and losers. We see them all around us: the winners and the losers. The losers can oftentimes become winners, and the winners can very easily become losers.

Our national drug is alcohol. We tend to regard the use of any other drug with special horror.

I see no reason why the artistic world can't absolutely merge with Madison Avenue. Pop art is a move in that direction. Why can't we have advertisements with beautiful words and beautiful images?

I'm an old-fashioned person, and I don't like informers.

Look at these poisonous color maps where flesh trees grow from human sacrifices; listen to these sniggering half-heard words of tenderness and doom from lips spotted with decay

Well, "disgusting" doesn't refer to the books but to the subjective reaction of the person making the complaint. I don't think that anything is disgusting per se. These words "disgusting" and "filthy," etc., have prevented us from undertaking any scientific experimentation in sexual matters.

There's a book called Mummy and the people actually seem to have become addicted to mummy dust. And mummy dust was somehow made from people who've died of the most loathsome diseases. It's too bad that [David] Cronenberg didn't see this book, see I only saw it after the film was made. It might have been of interest to him.