I have fun writing. I don't make it a chore. I don't have to struggle with it.

If you take a few days to write an outline, you're just making up scenes that you think will work, that you think will be interesting. But as you write it, other ideas occur - better ideas that have to do with what you're writing.

After 58 years you'd think writing would get easier. It doesn't. If you're lucky, you become harder to please. That's all right, it's still a pleasure.

I still read Hemingway. I still read his short stories because they're so good. He doesn't waste any words.

I don't believe in writer's block or waiting for inspiration. If you're a writer, you sit down and write.

I'm very much aware in the writing of dialogue, or even in the narrative too, of a rhythm. There has to be a rhythm with it … Interviewers have said, you like jazz, don’t you? Because we can hear it in your writing. And I thought that was a compliment.

A pen connects you to the paper. It definitely matters.