The ideal view for daily writing, hour for hour, is the blank brick wall of a cold-storage warehouse. Failing this, a stretch of sky will do, cloudless if possible.
The goat’s business is none of the sheep’s concern.
I never would just open a door and walk through, I had to bust it down for the hell of it. I just naturally liked doing things the hard way.
It’s difficult to write a really good short story because it must be a complete and finished reflection of life with only a few words to use as tools. There isn’t time for bad writing in a short story.
Writing, to be memorable, must be done in a state of impassioned serenity.
Imported actors, like certain wines, sometimes do not stand the ocean trip. This can be as true of American actors in Europe as it is of European actors in America.
I like any place that isn’t here.
Christmas is not a season. It is a feeling.
Texas history is a varied, tempestuous, and vast as the state itself. Texas yesterday is unbelievable, but no more incredible than Texas today. Today’s Texas is exhilarating, exasperating, violent, charming, horrible, delightful, alive.
A placated bully is a hand-fed bully.
The writer is a writer because he cannot help it. It is a compulsion.
It’s terrible to realize that you don’t learn how to live until you’re ready to die; and, then it’s too late.
Opinion! If every one had so little tact as to give their true opinion when it was asked this would be a miserable world.
Emma McChesney was engaged in that nerve-wracking process known as getting things out of the way. When Emma McChesney aimed to get things out of the way she did not use a shovel; she used a road-drag.
The small town smart set is deadly serious about its smartness.
There’s no sauce for play like work.
Take Texas the way Texas takes bourbon. Straight. It goes down easier.
It was part of theTexas ritual? We know about champagne and caviar but we talk hog and hominy.
People in big empty places are likely to behave very much as the gods did on Olympus.
There are two ways of doing battle against Disgrace. You may live it down; or you may run away from it and hide. The first method is heart-breaking, but sure. The second cannot be relied upon because of the uncomfortable way Disgrace has of turning up at your heels.