It's fine therapy for people who are perpetually scared of nameless threats as I am most of the time — for jittery people.

The stigma of self-inflicted death is for some people a hateful blot that demands erasure at all costs.

Writing is a form of self-flagellation.

I think that one of the compelling themes of fiction is this confrontation between good and evil.

It is hopelessness even more than pain that crushes the soul.

I get a fine warm feeling when I'm doing well, but that pleasure is pretty much negated by the pain of getting started each day. Let's face it, writing is hell.

What this country needs... what this great land of ours needs is something to happen to it. Something ferocious and tragic, like what happened to Jericho or the cities of the plain - something terrible I mean, son, so that when the people have been through hellfire and the crucible, and have suffered agony enough and grief, they’ll be people again, human beings, not a bunch of smug contented cows rooting at the trough.