“A writer should write with his eyes and a painter paint with his ears.”

“Musicians have notes. Painters have paint. Writers have words.”

“A writer writes with his genius; an artist paints with hers; everyone who creates operates from this sacramental center.”

“The concept of a writer writing a vivid and accurate scene in a language transparent and devoid of decoration so that we see through to the object without writerly distraction suffers the same contradiction as the concept of a painter painting a vivid and accurate scene with pigments transparent and devoid of color, including white and black—so that the paint will not get between us and the picture.”

“You never hear of a sportsman losing his sense of smell in a tragic accident and for good reason; in order for the universe to teach excruciating lessons that are unable to apply in later life, the sportsman must lose his legs, the philosopher his mind, the painter his eyes, the musician his ears, the chef his tongue.”

“For the film maker must come by his convention, as painters and writers and musicians have done before him.”