I like high school and college writing textbooks and find them very helpful. Whenever I'm stuck and seem to have no ideas, I open one up and turn to the back. There I'll find questions like, "Have you had any experiences with an alcoholic or a sailor?"

In America, if your next-door neighbor has a Rolls-Royce, you want one too. But in England, if your neighbor has a Rolls-Royce, you want him to die in a fiery accident. That's a quote from someone else, but there's something about American optimism, that feeling you can do anything if you're at least middle class in America. If I can have a writing career, anyone can. There's nothing special about me.

I don't like to read anything on the radio for the very first time, because I don't have any notion of a reaction. When I read it out loud, then I get an idea of that, and more of an idea of how to read.

I just enjoy lying on the couch and reading a magazine.

I don't really do very well when I'm sent somewhere. A lot of magazines want to send you somewhere to do something. They want you to stow away on a ship, or something like that.

In other parts of the country people tried to stay together for the sake of the children. In New York they tried to work things out for the sake of the apartment.

I'm not a reporter but the 'New Yorker' treats everyone like a reporter.