On Writing, or Ripping Your Hair Out

"I have made this letter longer because I did not have the time to make it shorter."

"I was working on the proof of one of my poems all the morning, and took out a comma. In the afternoon I put it back again."

"I'm all in favor of keeping dangerous weapons out of the hands of fools. Let's start with typewriters."

"You can approach the act of writing with nervousness, excitement, hopefulness, or even despair--the sense that you can never completely put on the page what's in your mind and heart. You can come to the act with your fists clenched and your eyes narrowed, ready to kick ass and take down names. You can come to it because you want a girl to marry you or because you want to change the world. Come to it any way but lightly. Let me say it again: you must not come lightly to the blank page."