“To rehearse imaginary conversations on paper is called literature. To do so out loud is called madness.”

“All writers are insecure, the male ones especially. It's well known. Why else would they spend so much time on make-believe? They're only happy in their imaginary worlds, because that's where they're in charge - where they're God. Did you know that Hemingway's mother dressed him as a girl until he was six years old?"I was not offended by Claudia's glib psychological theory. Like many glib psychological theories, it struck me as fundamentally correct.”

“For the writer under Actually Existing Socialism describing sex is a simple matter: he simply does not do it (the describing, I mean, not the sex).”

“We drank our coffee the Russian way. That is to say we had vodka before it and vodka afterwards.”

“Desire is an appetite, quickly sated. Longing is a wound, an opening in the heart or the spirit. Whatever the cause, whatever the duration, it almost always leaves a scar.”

“The wind funnelled down the covered platform, jostling the passengers and tearing at their clothes. A woman's scarf whipped by overhead, somersaulting as if intoxicated by the sudden taste of freedom.”

“I was already at an age when putting off anything was a bad idea.”