The novel doesn't come into existence until certain methods of reproducing fiction come along.

There are things in American culture that want to wipe the class distinction. Blue jeans. Ready-made clothes. Coca-Cola.

Henry Miller wrote novels, but he calls his protagonist Henry, often Henry Miller, and his books are in this gray area between memoir and novel.

I long for the raised voice, the howl of rage or love.

I think the pattern of my essays is, A funny thing happened to me on my way through Finnegans Wake.

Gertrude Stein really thought of Hemingway as frail. He almost married Stein.

The text is merely one of the contexts of a piece of literature, its lexical or verbal one, no more or less important than the sociological, psychological, historical, anthropological or generic.

Raymond Carver is good. I think he'll be appreciated more and more. He's an easy writer to imitate.

I have, I admit, a low tolerance for detached chronicling and cool analysis.

My assignment is what every writer's assignment is: tell the truth of his own time.

The black situation has changed. They finally realized they're Americans.

Happiness is not something we can find. Happiness is a state of being. It is a choice we make at any particular moment. It is a feeling we can choose without any reason.

Music. It’s not about those things. It’s about a feeling. It’s about expressing yourself. It’s about letting go.

Being sorry is the highest act of selfishness, seeing value only after discarding it.

I can't love you unless I give you up.

It makes no difference if I burn my bridges behind me - I never retreat.

The focus of subjectivity is a distorting mirror.

Some artists think every woman is a groupie, and that every dude is a sucker, and I never looked at people like that.

To write a book is for all the world like humming a song—be but in tune with yourself, madam, 'tis no matter how high or how low you take it.

Since I became a dancer, I have felt much better about myself.

Sometimes worst enemies like a Mohammed Ali and Joe Frazier that's what makes you fight so hard. Without them they never would have achieved greatness.