No man can write who is not first a humanitarian.

Hemingway shot himself. I don't like a man that takes the short way home.

My ideal job? Landlord of a bordello! The company's good and the mornings are quiet, which is the best time to write.

When they come, I write them, when they don't come, I don't.

With me, a story usually begins with a single idea or mental picture. The writing of the story is simply a matter of working up to that moment, to explain why it happened or what caused it to follow.

Man knows so little about his fellows. In his eyes all men or women act upon what he believes would motivate him if we were mad enough to do what that other man or woman is doing.

People need trouble-a little frustration to sharpen the spirit on, toughen it. Artists do, I don't mean you need to live in a rathole or gutter, but you do have to learn fortitude, endurance. Only vegetables are happy.

Everything goes by the board: honor, pride, decency ... to get the book written. If a writer has to rob his mother, he will not hesitate; the "Ode on a Grecian Urn" is worth any number of old ladies.

It is the writer's privilege to help man endure by lifting his heart.