I'm drawn to fiction that hints at nonfiction, that blurs or seems to blur the boundaries between invention and autobiography.

I'm still primarily interested in observing as closely as possible the shifting weather between people. I think the master of this sort of thing, and a writer who has meant a great deal to me, is Henry James: there's a magical way that he has of turning the slightest gesture into a whole world of drama and feeling.

For me, music was always a second language. I didn't have a musical background, and I started studying very late, at fourteen.

Whenever I go to New York I try to soak up as much live music as I can, including as many nights at the opera as I can manage.

None of us sees history fully; none of us is adequately aware of how the arrangements of the present moment foreclose the possibilities of others to fully live their only lives.

I studied opera, and when I left conservatory I told myself I would never sing in public again.

I am a gay writer, absolutely. And in no way does that fact limit the reach or importance of what I write.