The effects of MFA programs, and the rise of creative writing instruction more generally, are far more diffuse than people think. Even if you're a writer who has avoided institutions your whole life, you're still going to be reading a lot of writers who have MFAs, and are affiliated with universities.

It is no fun at all to have been writing a book for seven or so years, especially when you've never published anything before.

Most writers, most books, you have no idea whether it was a dollar or a million dollars.

The challenge for any fiction writer is that your job involves simply sitting at a desk for a very, very long time.

For many years I didn't have health insurance.

I sold a book six years after I left an MFA program. In between, there was a lot of endurance of poverty and a lot of fighting off doubt. It's all a part of the process of being or becoming a writer.

I do think that sports is really rich dramatically that, and this is kind of a self-serving thing to say, but I wonder why there aren't more, better sports novels.