Everybody needs his memories. They keep the wolf of insignificance from the door.

A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep.

California is like an artificial limb the rest of the country doesn't really need. You can quote me on that.

You never have to change anything you got up in the middle of the night to write.

I discovered that rejections are not altogether a bad thing. They teach a writer to rely on his own judgment and to say in his heart of hearts, 'To hell with you.'

A novel is balanced between a few true impressions and the multitude of false ones that make up most of what we call life.

She was what we used to call a suicide blond - dyed by her own hand.

When we ask for advice, we are usually looking for an accomplice.

What is art but a way of seeing?

There is an immense, painful longing for a broader, more flexible, fuller, more coherent, more comprehensive account of what we human beings are, who we are, and what this life is for.

Whoever wants to reach a distant goal must take small steps.

The presidency is now a cross between a popularity contest and a high school debate, with an encyclopedia of cliches the first prize.

All a writer has to do to get a woman is to say he's a writer. It's an aphrodisiac.

Any artist should be grateful for a naive grace which puts him beyond the need to reason elaborately.