A novelist writes a novel, and people read it. But reading is a solitary act. While it may elicit a varied and personal response, the communal nature of the audience is like having five hundred people read your novel and respond to it at the same time. I find that thrilling.

The impulse to write the poem, that impulse is a great dramatic impulse. But hell, anybody could write a play. I do know this: all writers are not dramatists. You may be a great writer, but that doesn't necessarily mean you're a dramatist. Very few people have done both.

You are responsible for the world that you live in.

You get to the point where your demons, which are terrifying, get smaller and smaller and you get bigger and bigger.

All of art is a search for ways of being, of living life more fully.

I think that's the core of black aesthetics: the ability to improvise. That is what has enabled our [black people's] survival.

You got to take the crookeds with the straights. That's what Papa used to say.