28 quotes
Canadian-American writer
“What is art but a way of seeing?”
"People don't realize how much they are in the grip of ideas. We live among ideas much more than we live in nature."
on Philosophy
"It's usually the selfish people who are loved the most. They do what you deny yourself, and you love them for it. You give them your heart."
on Love
"One thought-murder a day keeps the psychiatrist away."
on Humor
"Society is what beats me. Alone I can be pretty good, but let me go among people and there’s the devil to pay."
on Society
"You have to have the power to employ pain, to repent, to be illuminated, you must have the opportunity and even the time."
on Life
"A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
on Wisdom
"A man may say, "From now on I'm going to speak the truth." But the truth hears him and runs away and hides before he's even done speaking."
on Truth
"People can lose their lives in libraries. They ought to be warned."
"Just because your soul is being torn to pieces doesn't mean that you stop analyzing the phenomena."
"When we ask for advice, we are usually looking for an accomplice."
"Happiness can only be found if you can free yourself of all other distractions."
on Happiness
"Alternatives and particularly desirable alternatives grow only on imaginary trees."
on Imagination
"There is no limit to the amount of intelligence invested in ignorance when the need for illusion runs deep."
"Boredom is the conviction that you can't change ... the shriek of unused capacities."
"I am not an ornithologist—I am a bird."
on Identity
"A man should be able to hear, and to bear, the worst that could be said of him."
on Courage
"You never have to change anything you got up in the middle of the night to write."
on Writing
"God may save all, but human rescue is only for a few."
on Faith
"The flesh would shrink and go, the blood would dry, but no one believes in his mind of minds or heart of hearts that the pictures do stop."
"You never have to change anything you get up in the middle of the night to write."
