Every door opens to something and it is better to go toward that something than to sit staring at the blank wall of time.

Inspiration is just one requirement for being a writer. Another is keeping regular working hours.

There's no privacy for the violently dead.

Destiny is thrifty. To weave her tapestry, she uses even the tiniest snips of thread.

A country inn is a percolator. News seeps, simmers, and bubbles.

The newer education put stress on culture ... Saturday mornings, the young were brushed and washed, forced into blue cheviot suits, and dragged to children's concerts to learn appreciation. They wriggled, squirmed, counted the light bulbs in the ceiling, dived under seats to gather ticket stubs, stampeded out at intermissions. The weakness of their bladders was astounding.

of all the deprivations which afflict humankind, none is more dreadful than loneliness. A corrosive, it eats the heart out. People were meant to live by twos, with someone close with whom to share good and bad, to hear breathing in the dark room at night. Being alone is the one unnatural act.