It is technically very hard to show positive manifestations. But I can look back at the way I thought and felt even as a little kid and there was a lot of wonder there, and openness to the many sides of life.

I watched a bunch of kids movies on Christmas. I was kind of joking with our family by asking, "Is anyone allowed to die in a kid's movie anymore?"

Whether you're eighteen or sixty, in a certain way, whatever you know is valid.

Maybe you could even think 100,000 people are inside each human being. And you drop a novel on that person, and a certain number of those sub-people come alive or get reenergized for some finite time.

Each of us is born with a series of built-in confusions that are probably somehow Darwinian. These are: (1) we're central to the universe (that is, our personal story is the main and most interesting story, the only story, really); (2) we're separate from the universe (there's US and then, out there, all that other junk - dogs and swing-sets, and the State of Nebraska and low-hanging clouds and, you know, other people), and (3) we're permanent (death is real, o.k., sure - for you, but not for me).

The generalizing writer is like the passionate drunk, stumbling into your house mumbling: I know I'm not being clear, exactly, but don't you kind of feel what I'm feeling?

My mind goes really quickly and I tend to talk really fast, as you've probably heard, I sometimes lose track of my syntax, as I'm talking that fast. The only thing I try to do, well, it's slow down, but also I do something when I'm reading that's similar to when I'm writing a section, which is to really try to imagine you on the other side, in a certain way, as an intelligent, sympathetic presence who's rooting for me to tell you a good story.