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When I am working on a book or a story I write every morning as soon after first light as possible. There is no one to disturb you and it is cool or c...more

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Prose is architecture and the Baroque age is over.

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Good. Coffee is good for you. It's the caffeine in it. Caffeine, we are here. Caffeine puts a man on her horse and a woman in his grave.

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I do not think I have ever seen a nastier-looking man... Under the black hat, when I had first seen them, the eyes had been those of an unsuccessful r...more

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That was what you did. You died. You did not know what it was about. They threw you in and told you the rules and the first time they caught you off b...more

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In those days we did not trust anyone who had not been in the war, but we did notcompletely trust anyone.

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The people that I liked and had not met went to the big cafes because they were lost in them and no one noticed them and they could be alone in them a...more

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Below Les Avants there was a chalet where the pension was wonderful and we would be together and have our books and at night be warm in bed together w...more

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You have always written before and you will write now. All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know

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I had never known any man to die while speaking in terza-rima

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Hem, you know I don't think that owner's wife where you live likes me. She wouldn't let me wait upstairs for you.''I'll tell her,' I said.'Don't bothe...more

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The blue-backed notebooks, the two pencils and the pencil sharpener (a pocket knife was too wasteful) the marble-topped tables, the smell of early mor...more

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Only I have no luck any more. But who knows? Maybe today. Every day is a new day. It is better to be lucky. But I would rather be exact. Then when luc...more

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The fish is my friend too...I have never seen or heard of such a fish. But I must kill him. I am glad we do not have to try to kill the stars. Imagine...more

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wonder what day god created the egg' 'how should we know? we should not question. our stay on earth is not for long. let us rejoice and believe and gi...more