It was always clear to me that I would have to earn my readers, some I would have to find, some to create.

I cannot think of a country in which I would be happy with the government and dominant ideology and available propaganda.

What I don't like about America is not necessarily an American thing; it's a capitalist thing. This is the Vatican of capitalism.

I don't know the numbers, but roughly half of the people who came through Ellis Island returned home. They came here to make money, not to make history.

I'm a dilettante by temperament. I don't have any expectation.

I hate traveling and being away from my family. But I like meeting my readers, as what I write is actualized in them. Those encounters are exhilarating to me.

I want a book to contain a world - indeed the world. Writing is my main means of engagement with the world and I want the scars of that engagement to be left in the language.