My heroes are people like Philip Levine, who is simply like a god to me, as a writer. And he is a very good man, too.

The culture is with some rapidity fearing its imagination. I don't know why. Imagination is not of interest.

I don't think the world is particularly responsive to - our world, the culture we are in, to art right now.

What I try to do is read stuff that won't deal with the dangerous dark things I hope I am writing about.

I have a wonderful editor who believes in fiction and poetry. She herself is a novelist and poet.

First-book novelists and storywriters haven't yet failed and so it's easier to publish them - you can gamble on a success. Whereas someone who has written four books that are highly literary and demanding and require you as a reader. They may not be republished.

I know important literary writers who can't get published.