My parents told me they were going to kill me at least a thousand times growing up. "I'm gonna kill you," and then they'd whack me on the side of the head or whatever. And "What's wrong with you?" And "I'm gonna lock you up," and "I'm gonna throw you out the window," and "I'm gonna kill you." You know, all these things that you say in the heat of a normal chaotic household.

McSweeney's as a publishing company is built on a business model that only works when we sell physical books. So we try to put a lot of effort into the design and production of the book-as-object.

When I'm doing work online or on the computer, it's one thing. When I want to read, I want to go elsewhere, and I want to be away from the screen.

When anybody starts out with a memoir, you get the impulse to tell your own story with your own voice, and you get all that out in one fell swoop sometimes.

Good artists exist in what they make, and consequently are perfectly uninteresting in what they are.

I've purposely stayed away from reading much about postmodern theory, and most everything I have read just bored me to tears. I don't think anybody's written about it, or very few have, with any verve.

I love to be surprised or challenged or told that I know less than I thought that I knew. I know it's an old saw, but the older I get the less I know I know.