William Peter Blatty

“I tried to make every bit of it as creepy as I could. And I had the same response you do. I feel the same way. The hospital scenes, that procedure was so real.”

“Perhaps evil is the crucible of goodness... and perhaps even Satan - Satan, in spite of himself - somehow serves to work out the will of God.”

“Well, the research into it affected me. And the novel, it very much strengthened my faith.”

“What looked like morning was the beginning of endless night”

“We mourn the blossoms of May because they are to whither; but we know that May is one day to have its revenge upon November, by the revolution of that solemn circle which never stops---which teaches us in our height of hope, ever to be sober, and in our depth of desolation, never to despair.”

“I'm not aware that I was consciously influenced by any director, though these things often happen unnoticed, submerged in the unconscious.”

“Bantam Press. And they commissioned me to write it. And when that was completed, they sold it to Harper and Row. And then I put it out to every movie studio in town. And they all turned it down.”

“I didn't read The Haunting of Hill House until sometime early in the 1990's.”

“And there lies the heart of it, perhaps: in unworthiness. For I think belief in God is not a matter of reason at all; I think it finally is a matter of love: of accepting the possibility that God could ever love us.”

“Her shoes were comfortable. They reflected her hope for the evening.”

“I have never read horror, nor do I consider The Exorcist to be such, but rather as a suspenseful supernatural detective story, or paranormal police procedural.”

“Earth is a homicide victim. We lose our children. There are wars. Disease. And God comes strolling by like a cosmic Billie Burke.”

“Something unspeakable left the room.”

“We use concepts like "consciousness"---"mind"---"personality," but we don't really know yet what these things are.' He was shaking his head. 'Not really. Not at all.”

“As far as God goes, I _am_ a nonbeliever. Still am. But when it comes to a devil---well, that's something else.”

“I get cassettes near Academy Award time of every movie that's made that thinks it has some kind of chance for a nomination - that's when I watch my movies.”

“I've been campaigning like anything for restoring these changes. For 27 years. I wrote a book about it, well, a portion of the book was devoted to these scenes and why they should have been in the movie.”

“I lived in Georgetown in the late '70s about four houses down from the steps.”

“I'd sold the book first. Actually to a paperback publisher. I had nothing. I just had the idea.”

“God never talks. But the devil keeps advertising, Father. The devil does a lot of commercials.”