Yes, writing is essential to me. It's my way of living in the world.

Yes, writing is essential to me. It's my way of living in the world.

I believe that, in an ideal world, writers would feel free to write what matters to them without having to consider success, failure, the market, etc.

I think that one of the great things about spending - as in my case - twenty-something years with somebody is that at some point you do love the actual person. They're there little by little, the outline is really pretty clear.

Maybe that, really, is as good a definition as any of an artist in the world: a ruthless person.

I think there's no question that there's a reason why small children make great art and why slightly bigger children don't. And it's because small children don't worry about what anybody else thinks and slightly bigger children start to worry about these things.

We read to find life, in all its possibilities.