The stories on standardized tests don't have one author, therefore they can never authentically be in the first person. Imagine that! Everywhere, there are these tests that have been written by multiple people.

I don't have any doubts that I need writing. I need it personally because this is the way I think.

As a child, all you see is that adults are not playing. Adults are not talking too much. Adults don't want to relate to each other.

You are told that you have to eliminate un-useful sentences, but as a writer you know how important details are.

The ways in which a standardized language test induces storytelling, for example, is the opposite of creative writing; you have to learn a logical way to start a story, whereas in creative writing you may begin at the end or begin at the middle of the story.

Literature is about getting in touch. It sounds so hippie, but it really is about sharing stuff. We are a community that doesn't seem to be important for the rest of society, but we are people who want to get in touch - really in touch. We want to be thinking together.

For me, writing is a way of finding out about things I didn't know before I began writing.