My own experience is that once a story has been written, one has to cross out the beginning and the end. It is there that we authors do most of our lying.
When all is said and done, no literature can outdo the cynicism of real life; you won’t intoxicate with one glass someone who has already drunk up a whole barrel.
Everything on earth is beautiful, everything — except what we ourselves think and do when we forget the higher purposes of life and our own human dignity.
