I think that one of the compelling themes of fiction is this confrontation between good and evil.
William StyronThe stigma of self-inflicted death is for some people a hateful blot that demands erasure at all costs.
William StyronWhat 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, theyโll be people again, human beings, not a bunch of smug contented cows rooting at the trough.
William StyronA disruption of the circadian cycleโthe metabolic and glandular rhythms that are central to our workaday lifeโseems to be involved in many, if not most, cases of depression; this is why brutal insomnia so often occurs and is most likely why each dayโs pattern of distress exhibits fairly predictable alternating periods of intensity and relief.
William StyronIn depression . . . faith in deliverance, in ultimate restoration, is absent. The pain is unrelenting, and what makes the condition intolerable is the foreknowledge that no remedy will come - - not in a day, an hour, a month, or a minute . . . It is hopelessness even more than pain that crushes the soul.
William Styron