Words can be like X-rays if you use them properly -- they’ll go through anything. You read and you’re pierced.

A bad book is as much of a labor to write as a good one; it comes as sincerely from the author's soul.

A funny little literary article in the hand is worth at least three Critiques of Pure Reason in the bush.

I believe one would write better if the climate were bad. If there were a lot of wind and storms for example...

Men find a new universe of thought and feeling, clearer and more comprehensible than the universe of daily experience.

How can one be violent about the sort of things one's expected to write about? Words can be like X-rays, if you use them properly_they'll go through anything. You read and you're pierced.

The strange words rolled through his mind; rumbled, like talking thunder; like the drums at the summer dances, if the drums could have spoken; like the men singing the Corn Song, beautiful, beautiful, so that you cried.

he had been making an unsuccessful effort to write something about nothing in particular

If you want to write, keep cats.