The Great Is Seldom A Deterrent To

[on Sociability In Italy:] You May Be A Hermit Or An Innkeeper.

Adversity Is A Great Teacher, But This Teacher Makes Us Pay Dearly For Its Instruction; And Often The Profit We Derive, Is Not Worth The Price We Paid.

Gertrude Stein, All Courage And Will, Is A Soldier Of Minimalism. Her Work, Unlike The Resonating Silences In The Art Of Samuel Beckett, Embodies In Its Loquacity And Verbosity The Curious Paradox Of The Minimalist Form. This Art Of The Nuance In Repetition And Placement She Shares With The Orchestral Compositions Of Philip Glass.

Sentences In Which I Have Tried For A Certain Light Tone -- Many Of Those Have To Do With Events, Upheavals, Destructions That Caused Me To Weep Like A Child.

A Letter Is Not A Dialogue Or Even An Omniscient Exposition. It Is A Fabric Of Surfaces, A Mask, A Form As Well Suited To Affectations As To The Affections. The Letter Is, By Its Natural Shape, Self-justifying; It Is One's Own Evidence, Deposition, A Self-serving Testimony. In A Letter The Writer Holds All The Cards, Controls Everything About Himself And About Those Assertions He Wishes To Make Concerning Events Or The Worth Of Others. For Completely Self-centered Characters, The Letter Form Is A Complex And Rewarding Activity.