Writers must fortify themselves with pride and egotism as best they can. The process is analogous to using sandbags and loose timb...ers to protect a house against flood. Writers are vulnerable creatures like anyone else. For what do they have in reality? Not sandbags, not timbers. Just a flimsy reputation and a name.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The hard necessity of bringing the judge on the bench down into the dock has been the peculiar responsibility of the writer in all... ages of man.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Paper is soft and ink is fluid; it might be better if some pages of this chronicle could be written on chips of granite at the poi...nt of steel.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Every writer hopes or boldly assumes that his life is in some sense exemplary, that the particular will turn out to be universal.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The writer in western civilization has become not a voice of his tribe, but of his individuality. This is a very narrow-minded sit...uation.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The sky calls To the deaf earth. The proverbial disarray... Of morning corrects itself as you stand up. You are wearing a text.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Alone with our madness and favorite flower We see that there really is nothing left to write about.... Or rather, it is necessary to write about the same old things In the same way, repeating the same things over and over For love to continue and be gradually different.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
That's why I quit and took up writing poetry instead. It's clean, it's relaxing, it doesn't squirt juice all over... Something you were certain of a minute ago and now your own face Is a stranger and no one can tell you it's true. Hey, stupid!LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »