“Americans will eat anything if it is toasted and held together with a couple of toothpicks and has lettuce sticking out of the sides, preferably a little wilted.”

“The challenge of screenwriting is to say much in little and then take half of that little out and still preserve an effect of leisure and natural movement.”

“She's a charming middle-aged lady with a face like a bucket of mud and if she has washed her hair since Coolidge's second term I'll eat my spare tyre, rim and all.”

“I have a bad habit of starting a book and reading just far enough to make sure I want to read it and look forward to reading and then putting it to one side while I break the ice on a couple more. In that way, when I feel dull and depressed which is too often, I know I have something to read late at night when I do most of it and not that horrid blank feeling of not having anybody to talk to or listen to.”

“After a little while I felt a little better, but very little. I needed a drink, I needed a lot of life insurance, I needed a vacation, I needed a home in the country. What I had was a coat, a hat and a gun. I put them on and went out of the room.”

“As it is she will probably turn out to be one of these acid-faced virgins that sit behind little desks in public libraries and stamp dates in books.”

“Everything a writer learns about the art or craft of fiction takes just a little away from his need or desire to write at all. In the end he knows all of the tricks and has nothing to say.”