The more I like a book, the more slowly I read. . . . this spontaneous talking back to a book [is] one of the things that makes reading so valuable."

"The tension between "yes" and "no," between "I can" and "I cannot," makes us feel that, in so many instances, human life is an interminable debate with one's self."

"His father, Vincent, took him to La Coupole in Paris and, after sitting on the terrace for a while, walked off and forgot him. It was the perfect start in life for a writer."

It is one of the paradoxes of American literature that our writers are forever looking back with love and nostalgia at lives they couldn't wait to leave.

"Either a writer doesn't want to talk about his work, or he talks about it more than you want."