You should write first drafts as if they will never be shown to anyone.

Plot is just a fancy way of saying 'and then.

We all have fantasies about sex that are more perfect than anything in reality.

I am not sure if love is a salve or just a deeper kind of wound.

I think we’re [men and women] more similar. In that we all deal with our fantasy lives and sometimes are disappointed by reality.

If we ban whatever offends any group in our diverse society, we will soon have no art, no culture, no humor, no satire. Satire is by its nature offensive. So is much art and political discourse. The value of these expressions far outweighs their risk.

A dreary censorship, and self-censorship, has been imposed on books by the centralization of the book industry.