Please, God, Send Me Something

Man," He Said, "i'm Not Afraid Of Graveyards. The Dead Are Just, You Know, People Who Wanted The Same Things You And I Want." "what Do We Want?" I Asked Blurrily. "aw, Man, You Know," He Said. "we Just Want, Well, The Same Things These People Wanted." "what Was That?" He Shrugged. "to Live, I Guess," He Said.

Language In Fiction Is Made Up Of Equal Parts Meaning And Music. The Sentences Should Have Rhythm And Cadence, They Should Engage And Delight The Inner Ear.

It's The City's Crush And Heave That Move You; Its Intricacy; Its Endless Life. You Know The Story About Manhattan As A Wilderness Purchased For Strings Of Beads, But You Find It Impossible Not To Believe That It Has Always Been A City; That If You Dug Beneath It You Would Find The Ruins Of Another, Older City, And Then Another And Another.

At The Risk, Then, Of Being Shunned By Some Of My Gloomier Peers, I Venture To Tell You That Writers Work Like Demons, Suffer Greatly, And Are Also Happy, In Unmistakable Ways, Some Of The Time. If We Had No Knowledge Of Happiness, Our Novels Wouldn't Sufficiently Resemble Real Life. Some Of Us Are Even Made A Little Bit Happy, On Occasion, By The Writing Process Itself. I Mean, Really, If There Wasn't Some Sort Of Enjoyment To Be Derived, Would Any Of Us Keep Doing It?

I Suspect Any Serious Reader Has A First Great Book, Just The Way Anybody Has A First Kiss.