When I write I know that I'm going to have to produce 40 percent more than I need.

I've had that situation where I start writing somebody really miserable, and in order to make the story come alive, I have to give them a vote of confidence, make him vulnerable or wounded. But in real life, you often meet people who, in that particular moment, actually shouldn't get a vote of confidence.

My heartfelt wish for you: as you get older, your self will diminish and you will grow in love.

I think about how I conceptualize the audience. The trick is that they've got to be smarter and more worldly than me. So as I'm revising, I'm keeping that in mind. I cannot condescend, even a little bit. Every single choice that I make is motivated by that.

When I was a kid, I took 'The Brady Bunch' and 'The Partridge Family' very seriously. It was a world to me in the same way that the Greek myths would have been had I read them. You know, Marcia is Athena and Mr. Brady is Zeus.

I think it was a big revelation to me earlier in my life that people who appear to be evil are actually not. In other words, nobody wakes up in the morning and says, "Yuck, yuck, yuck, I'm gonna be evil."

If a writer understands his work as something that originates with him but then, with any luck, gets away from him, then what he needs is someone who can grasp the potential of the piece and lead him to that higher ground.