The object of the passion is just an accessory to the passion itself.

Make sure the lubricant is unscented. Don't join fashionable 'schools of thought.' Read everything.

Art is the Western myth, with which we both console ourselves and make ourselves.

The choices a writer makes within a tradition - preferring Milton to Moliere, caring for Barth over Barthelme - constitute some of the most personal information we can have about him.

It's got two aspects. The bit that involves the public life I could not really tolerate and cannot really tolerate. I just can't get used to the idea of being somebody unreal in people's minds. I can't live my life like that.

I tap danced for ten years before I began to understand people don't make musicals anymore. All I wanted to do was be at MGM working for Arthur Freed or Gene Kelly or Vincent Minelli. Historical and geographical constraints made this impossible. Slowly but surely the pen became mightier than the double pick-up time step with shuffle.

It made me feel that I had to work very hard, but I've always felt I had to work very hard to get my own approval.