My pride and my idea of myself were subject to slaughter in such a vice. . . . I used to wake up in those days. . . , and the beasts who were ready to root in my entrails were prowling outside. To a man living on his edge, New York is a jungle . . . . It was not so very funny. In the absence of a greater faith, a professional keeps himself in shape by remaining true to his professionalism.
Amateurs write when they are drunk.
For a serious writer to do that is equivalent to a professional football player throwing imaginary passes in traffic when he is bombed, and smashing his body into parked cars on the mistaken impression that he is taking out the linebacker. Such a professional football player will feel like crying in the morning when he discovers his ribs are broken. I would feel like crying too. My pride, my substance, my capital, was to be found in my clarity of mind . . . . And yet Mailer brought himself back from these depths, and went on to accomplish more in his life and art than he had before this period of depression.