“There sprang up between them the light jesting conversation of people who are free and satisfied, to whom it does not matter where they go or what they talk about.”

“It was too important a matter, this talking to people, and listening to them, to do it lightly or often.”

“Even with the utterly lost, to whom life and death are equally jests, there are matters of which no jest can be made.”

“Somehow, we'll find it. The balance between whom we wish to be and whom we need to be. But for now, we simply have to be satisfied with who we are.”

“I soaked the conversations up like a sponge, pulled them apart, rearranged them to make their origins disappear, and when I told them to the same people who had told the stories earlier, they were bewildered by the coincidence between what I said and what they were thinking.”

“My advice for aspiring writers is go to New York. And if you can’t go to New York, go to the place that represents New York to you, where the standards for writing are high, there are other people who share your dreams, and where you can talk, talk, talk about your interests. Writing books begins in talking about it, like most human projects, and in being close to those who have already done what you propose to do.”