We've come under the influence of television, where in all honesty we can follow a show that could just get cancelled midway through the season and the entire plotline never resolves itself.

I like the idea of the book being wiser than the person who wrote it. None of the novels I've written are direct transcriptions of me blathering over dinner with a glass of wine in my hand. I don't hold any illusion of those conversations being of particular value. The books, though, are - I hope - bigger than my opinions, investigations that go beyond my own intellect or wit.

Every time I try to write on vacation, I fail miserably.

The death drive is parasitic. It runs off of other drives, leeching off of them.

I don't think secrets are a bad thing. I think there's this idea that everything needs to be transparent in order for it to be free.

The Greeks really believed in history. They believed that the past had consequences and that you might be punished for the sins of your father. America, and particularly New York, runs on the idea that history doesn't matter. There is no history. There is only the never-ending present. You don't even have your family because you moved here to get away from them, so even that idea of personal history has been cut at the knees.

I was a very scared child.