Never think that you’re not good enough yourself. A man should never think that. My belief is that in life people will take you very much at your own reckoning.

Those who have courage to love should have courage to suffer.

Three hours a day will produce as much as a man ought to write.

A man who thinks much of his words as he writes them will generally leave behind him work that smells of oil.

Beware of creating tedium! I know no guard against this so likely to be effective as the feeling of the writer himself. When once the sense that the thing is becoming long and has grown upon him, he may be sure that it will grow upon his readers.

Very much of a novelist’s work must appertain to the intercourse between young men and young women.

A novelist’s characters must be with him as he lies down to sleep, and as he wakes from his dreams. He must learn to hate them and to love them.