“Meaning is like pornography, you know it when you see it.”

“The truth is a strange thing. Like pornography, you know it when you see it.”

“Like art, love, and pornography, noir is hard to define, but you know it when you see it. For the purposes of the book and my longtime working understanding and definition of it, noir stories are bleak, existential, alienated, pessimistic tales about losers--people who are so morally challenged that they cannot help but bring about their own ruin.”

“I don't know what the definition of pornography is and nobody else does either. Pornography is somebody else's erotica that you don't like. People are interested in their own sexuality and they've always reflected it in their art. End of story.”

“You know, like when you look in the mirror and the thing you see is not the thing as it really is.”

“You know, they say when someone keeps making excuses to say your name it means they like you.”