“I am telling you what I know—words have music and if you are a musician you will write to hear them.”

“Writing teachers invariably tell students, write about what you know. That's, of course, what you have to do, but on the other hand, how do you know what you know until you've written it? Writing is knowing... I've had very little experience in my life. In fact, I try to avoid experience if I can. Most experience is bad.”

“There is music in words, and it can be heard you know, by thinking.”

“She's some kind of Socialist-anarchist-anarcho-syndicalist-Communist. Unless you're one of them you can't tell exactly what any of them are.”

“And to top everything he's got this problem he can't let her know how he feels: What-he's shy? Shy! Tell me who in this goddamn world is shy? Young, old, the lame and halt. Clobber you over the head with what they feel. Oh Man I wish just once in my long fucked-up life someone had come up to me who was too shy to tell me what they thought of me...”

“Writing is an exploration. You start from nothing.”

“Writing is like driving at night in the fog. You can only see as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.”