“If you ever have children, tell them they must always be drunk. Drunk on love, drunk on poetry, drunk on wine, it doesn’t matter. This world is too goddamn painful to waste a second of your existence sober.”

“One should always be drunk. That's all that matters...But with what? With wine, with poetry, or with virtue, as you chose. But get drunk.”

“And yes. They did become very drunk, the three of them.And you're not supposed to be drunk when you get involved in matters such as this: Big Matters, Matters of an Apocalyptic Nature. You're supposed to be coldly sober. And you just can't be coldly sober when you're drunk.”

“With wine, poetry, or virtueas you choose.But get drunk.”

“In order not to feel time's horrid fardel bruise your shoulders, grinding you into the earth, get drunk and stay that way. On what? On wine, poetry, virtue, whatever. But get drunk!”

“Sometimes I write drunk and revise sober, and sometimes I write sober and revise drunk. But you have to have both elements in creation — the Apollonian and the Dionysian, or spontaneity and restraint, emotion and discipline.”