Writers sometimes are paid a great deal of money, but much more frequently they're not paid or are paid only a little bit.

Maybe we're stuck with who we are.

Whoever would write books? It's suffering as well as greatly satisfying. And certainly there's suffering in the sense that you don't know for a long time how to do it.

Every once in a while someone says, 'You can't really learn anything, if you're really a writer then you wouldn't need to do it.' But I think what people need is the sense of not being alone. They go to MFA programs to be part of a community of people who care, and then you start caring about your friend who is trying to edit a magazine and your other friend who is stuck in the middle of her poem. There you have all kinds of things to worry about besides your own success.

Sometimes it's interesting to see what people who have too much control need to do to write freely.

I just like doing it, I like writing.

I love to read nonfiction and memoir, but I'm mostly interested in the piece of writing more than the person.