It is my contention that a really great novel is made with a knife and not a pen. A novelist must have the intestinal fortitude to cut out even the most brilliant passage so long as it doesn’t advance the story.

Each man’s death is fated from the beginning of time.

Maturity is reached the day we don’t need to be lied to about anything.

Maturity is reached the day we don't need to be lied to about anything.

It is my contention that a really great novel is made with a knife and not a pen. A novelist must have the intestinal fortitude to cut out even the most brilliant passage so long as it doesn't advance the story.

The middle years - the eighteen-seventies, 'eighties, 'nineties - were a time of moral bankruptcy when men stole millions by a stroke of the pen or by the simple expedient of printing tons of worthless paper.

Writing a novel is like building a wall brick by brick; only amateurs believe in inspiration.

Each man's death is fated from the beginning of time.

When it was over, it was not really over, and that was the trouble.

About fifteen miles above New Orleans the river goes very slowly. It has broadened out there until it is almost a sea and the water is yellow with the mud of half a continent. Where the sun strikes it, it is golden.