Talent is what you possess; genius is what possesses you.

The germ of a story is a new and simple element introduced into an existing situation or mood.

They tell you that you'll lose your mind when you grow older. What they don't tell you is that you won't miss it very much.

Put cotton in your ears and pebbles in your shoes. Pull on rubber gloves. Smear Vaseline over your glasses, and there you have it: instant old age.

It is the fear of being as dependent as a young child, while not being loved as a child is loved, but merely being kept alive against one's will.

Writing offers fairly large rewards to a few successful people, but the rewards come late, and most writers are failures.

Be kind and considerate with your criticism... It's just as hard to write a bad book as it is to write a good book.

Authors are sometimes like tomcats: They distrust all the other toms but they are kind to kittens

Any fiction should be a story. In any story there are three elements: persons, a situation, and the fact that in the end something has changed. If nothing has changed, it isn't a story.

Going back to Hemingway's work after several years is like going back to a brook where you had often fished and finding the woods as deep and cool as they used to be.

Age is not different from earlier life as long as you're sitting down

Never take today for granted, tomorrow might never come.

I'm the type of person who wakes up at 12 AM just to write down a sudden idea that gets in my head. I have a never ending imagination.

I have found that it is much easier to make a success in life than to make a success of one's life.

The fallout from slavery is ongoing. I am not sure the issue of race in America will ever be completely solved.

My work is about my life as an event, and I find myself to be very temporal, transient.

If you don't make up your mind, your unmade mind will unmake you.

If I blew my nose the Daily Express and the Daily Mail would say that I am trying to spread germ warfare.

If something happened to me, whose face will be on the front page of the paper begging for me? Is a person worth more because they have someone to grieve for them?

There is something about believing God that will cause Him to pass over a million people to get to you

If you stay ready, you don't have to get ready.