I have never thought of myself as a good writer. Anyone who wants reassurance of that should read one of my first drafts. But I'm one of the world's great rewriters.

Whenever I start a book, I swear it's going to be a short one. But then it's, 'Who was his grandfather? And how did he get there in the first place? And what kind of animals is he chasing?'

Rampaging horsemen can conquer; only the city can civilize.

I think the crucial thing in the writing career is to find what you want to do and how you fit in. What somebody else does is of no concern whatever except as an interesting variation.

I was brought up in the great tradition of the late nineteenth century: that a writer never complains, never explains and never disdains.

The permanent temptation of life is to confuse dreams with reality. The permanent defeat of life comes when dreams are surrendered to reality.