I have seldom written a story, long or short, that I did not have to write and rewrite. There are single stories of mine that have taken me ten or twelve years to get written.

Dare to be strong and courageous. That is the road. Venture anything.

The object of art is not to make salable pictures. It is to save yourself.

The lives of people are like young trees in a forest. They are being choked by climbing vines. The vines are old thoughts and beliefs planted by dead men.

You won’t arrive. It is an endless search.

There is within every human being a deep well of thinking over which a heavy iron lid is kept clamped.

I think the whole glory of writing lies in the fact that it forces us out of ourselves and into the lives of others.

The thing of course, is to make yourself alive. Most people remain all of their lives in a stupor.

I go about looking at horses and cattle. They eat grass, make love, work when they have to, bear their young. I am sick with envy of them.

It was a cold day but the sun was out and the trees were like great bonfires against gray distant fields and hills.

The whole object of education is...to develop the mind. The mind should be a thing that works.

There is no pre-established harmony between the furtherance of truth and the well-being of mankind.

Pastor Face Your Business” When people say this they mean that I must just stay behind the pulpit and preach

The days draw out, the weather gets warmer, and it's what we call summer, with a bitter laugh when we've said it.

I think it is really sad that when people lose their homes they kind of lose their minds too.

Charlie Christian showed me a lot, and was a great help, but even then, I realised that if I was going to make it, it was no use copying Charlie

I never quite understand why we watch the news. There doesn't really seem much point watching somebody tell you what the news is when you could quite easily listen to it on the radio...

I fell in love with the public, the public fell in love with me, and I tried to keep it that way.

The single and most dangerous word to be spoken in business is no. The second most dangerous word is yes. It is possible to avoid saying either.

Ignorance might be bliss, but it's irresponsible and dangerous too.

I've always hated litigation, and I continue to hate it.