Each morning my characters greet me with misty faces willing, though chilled, to muster for another day's progress through the dazzling quicksand the marsh of blank paper.

When I write, I aim in my mind not toward New York but toward a vague spot a little to the east of Kansas.

I think 'taste' is a social concept and not an artistic one. I'm willing to show good taste, if I can, in somebody else's living room, but our reading life is …

Suspect each moment, for it is a thief, tiptoeing away with more than it brings.