Writing books is certainly a most unpleasant occupation. It is lonesome, unsanitary, and maddening. Many authors go crazy.
When I was little, I had this science book. There was a section on ‘What would happen to the world if there was no friction?’ Answer: ‘Everything on earth would fly into space from the centrifugal force of revolution.’ That was my mood.
Which is why I am writing this book. To think. To understand. It just happens to be the way I’m made. I have to write things down to feel I fully comprehend them.
I’m a very ordinary human being; I just happen to like reading books.
Have books ‘happened’ to you? Unless your answer to that question is ‘yes,’ I’m unsure how to talk to you.
To be able to talk to your heart’s content about a book you like with someone who feels the same way about it is one of the greatest joys that life can offer.
I like to read books. I like to listen to music.
There weren’t any curtains in the windows, and the books that didn’t fit into the bookshelf lay piled on the floor like a bunch of intellectual refugees.
I didn’t have much to say to anybody but kept to myself and my books. With my eyes closed, I would touch a familiar book and draw it’s fragrance deep inside me. This was enough to make me happy.
The world in books seemed so much more alive to me than anything outside. I could see things I’d never seen before. Books and music were my best friends. I had a couple of good friends at school, but never met anyone I could really speak my heart to.
It is the same with anything – you have to learn through your own experience, paying your own way. You can’t learn it from a book.
I hate requests. They make me feel unhappy. It’s like when I take a book out of the library. As soon as I start to read it, all I can think about is when I’ll finish it.
The curious thing about individuals is that their singularity always goes beyond any category or generalization in the book.
I’ve always liked libraries. They’re quiet and full of books and full of knowledge.
Like a Chinese box, the world of the novel contained smaller worlds, and inside those were yet smaller worlds. Together, these worlds made up a single universe, and the universe waited there in the book to be discovered by the reader.
I am 55 years old now. It takes three years to write one book. I don’t know how many books I will be able to write before I die. It is like a countdown. So with each book I am praying – please let me live until I am finished.
The good thing about writing book is that you can dream while you are awake...
Nights without work I spend with whisky and books.
I don’t know how many good books I still have in me; I hope there are another four or five.
My priority is my books, at least at this point. What I have to do is write the narrative of this time.