"My major regret in life is that my childhood was unnecessarily lonely."

"Writing stopped being fun when I discovered the difference between good writing and bad and, even more terrifying, the difference between it and true art. And after that, the whip came down."

"I got this idea of doing a really serious big work-it would be precisely like a novel, with a single difference: Every word of it would be true from beginning to end."

"Writing has laws of perspective, of light and shade just as painting does, or music. If you are born knowing them, fine. If not, learn them. Then rearrange the rules to suit yourself."

"No one will ever know what 'In Cold Blood' took out of me. It scraped me right down to the marrow of my bones. It nearly killed me. I think, in a way, it did kill me."

"I was eleven, then I was sixteen. Though no honors came my way, those were the lovely years."

"All literature is gossip."

"The quietness of his tone italicized the malice of his reply."

"It is the want to know the end that makes us believe in God, or witchcraft, believe, at least, in something."

"Fame is only good for one thing - they will cash your check in a small town."

"Friendship is a pretty full-time occupation if you really are friendly with somebody. You can't have too many friends because then you're just not really friends."

"I like to talk on TV about those things that aren't worth writing about."

"That isn't writing at all, it's typing."

"When God hands you a gift, he also hands you a whip; and the whip is intended for self-flagellation solely."

"Life is a moderately good play with a badly written third act."

"To me, the greatest pleasure of writing is not what it's about, but the inner music that words make."

"Venice is like eating an entire box of chocolate liqueurs in one go."

"Love is a chain of love as nature is a chain of life."

"I don't care what anybody says about me as long as it isn't true."

"A conversation is a dialogue, not a monologue. That's why there are so few good conversations: due to scarcity, two intelligent talkers seldom meet."

"Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor."