No grand idea was ever born in a conference, but a lot of foolish ideas have died there.

It is sadder to find the past again and find it inadequate to the present than it is to have it elude you and remain forever a harmonious conception of memory.

There was never a good biography of a good novelist. There couldn't be. He is too many people if he's any good.

It's not a slam at you when people are rude-it's a slam at the people they've met before.

It is in the thirties that we want friends. In the forties we know they won't save us any more than love did.

So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.

I had that familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer. F.

There is no confusion like the confusion of a simple mind. F.

To write it, it took three months; to conceive it ? three minutes; to collect the data in it ? all my life. F.

Sometimes it is harder to deprive oneself of a pain than of a pleasure. F.