Amid the pointing and the horror, the clean flame.

— William Faulkner

An artist is a creature driven by demons. He doesn't know why they choose him, and he's usually too busy to wonder why.

— William Faulkner

And even a liar can be scared into telling the truth, same as honest man can be tortured into telling a lie.

— William Faulkner

And George Far had the town, the earth, the world to himself and his sorrow. Music came faint as a troubling rumor beneath the spring night, sweetened by distance: a longing knowing no ease. (Oh God, oh God!) At last George Far gave up trying to see her. He had 'phoned vainly and time after time, at last the telephone became the end in place of the means: he had forgotten why he wanted to reach her. Finally, he told himself that he hated her, that he would go away; finally he was going to as many pains to avoid her as he had been to see her. So he slunk about the streets like a criminal, avoiding her, feeling his very heart stop when he did occasionally see her unmistakable body from a distance. And at night he lay sleepless and writhing to think of her, then to rise and don a few garments and walk past her darkened house, gazing in slow misery in the room in which he knew she lay, soft and warm, in intimate slumber, then to return to home and bed to dream of her brokenly.

— William Faulkner

And I reckon them that are good must suffer for it the same as them that are bad.

— William Faulkner

And so I told myself to take that one. Because Father said clocks slay time. He said time is dead as long as it is being clicked off by little wheels; only when the clock stops does time come to life. The hands were extended, slightly off the horizontal at a faint angle, like a gull tilting into the wind.

— William Faulkner

And so sometimes I would think how the devil had conquered God.

— William Faulkner

And sure enough, even waiting will end...if you can just wait long enough.

— William Faulkner

And when a man that old takes up money-hunting, it's like when he takes up gambling or whiskey or women. He ain't going to have time to quit.

— William Faulkner

At one time I thought the most important thing was talent. I think now that — the young man or the young woman must possess or teach himself, train himself, in infinite patience, which is to try and to try and to try until it comes right. He must train himself in ruthless intolerance. That is, to throw away anything that is false no matter how much he might love that page or that paragraph. The most important thing is insight, that is ... curiosity to wonder, to mull, and to muse why it is that man does what he does. And if you have that, then I don't think the talent makes much difference, whether you've got that o

— William Faulkner