“I don't know if this is true to you but for mesometimes it gets so badthat anything elsesay likelooking at a bird on an overheadpower lineseems as great as a Beethoven symphony.then you forget it and you're backagain.”

“Look, you're small-town. I've had over 50 jobs, maybe a hundred. I've never stayed anywhere long. What I am trying to say is, there is a certain game played in offices all over America. The people are bored, they don't know what to do, so they play the office-romance game. Most of the time it means nothing but the passing of time. Sometimes they do manage to work off a screw or two on the side. But even then, it is just an offhand pasttime, like bowling or t.v. or a New Year's Eve party. You've got to understand that it doesn't mean anything and then you won't get hurt. Do you understand what I mean?"I think that Mr. Partisan is sincere."You're going to get stuck with that pin, babe, don't forget what I told you. Watch those slicks. They are as phony as a lead dime.”

“Writing is something that you don't know how to do. You sit down and it's something that happens, or it may not happen. So, how can you teach anybody how to write? It's beyond me, because you yourself don't even know if you're going to be able to. I'm always worried, well, you know, every time I go upstairs with my wine bottle. Sometimes I'll sit at that typewriter for fifteen minutes, you know. I don't go up there to write. The typewriter's up there. If it doesn't start moving, I say, well this could be the night that I hit the dust.”

“SO YOU WANT TO BE A WRITERif it doesn't come bursting out of youin spite of everything,don't do it.unless it comes unasked out of yourheart and your mind and your mouthand your gut,don't do it.if you have to sit for hoursstaring at your computer screenor hunched over yourtypewritersearching for words,don't do it.if you're doing it for money orfame,don't do it.if you're doing it because you wantwomen in your bed,don't do it.if you have to sit there andrewrite it again and again,don't do it.if it's hard work just thinking about doing it,don't do it.if you're trying to write like somebodyelse,forget about it.if you have to wait for it to roar out ofyou,then wait patiently.if it never does roar out of you,do something else.if you first have to read it to your wifeor your girlfriend or your boyfriendor your parents or to anybody at all,you're not ready.don't be like so many writers,don't be like so many thousands ofpeople who call themselves writers,don't be dull and boring andpretentious, don't be consumed with self-love.the libraries of the world haveyawned themselves tosleepover your kind.don't add to that.don't do it.unless it comes out ofyour soul like a rocket,unless being still woulddrive you to madness orsuicide or murder,don't do it.unless the sun inside you isburning your gut,don't do it.when it is truly time,and if you have been chosen,it will do it byitself and it will keep on doing ituntil you die or it dies in you.there is no other way.and there never was.”

“Your parents don't give you much love, do they?''I don't need that stuff,' I told her.'Henry, everybody needs love.''I don't need anything.''You poor boy.”

“It's all overrated, man. Sex is only a great thing if you're not getting any.”

“As we live we all get caught and torn by various traps. Nobody escapes them. Some even live with them. The idea is to realize that a trap is a trap. If you are in one and you don't realize it, then you're finished.”