Literature, fiction, poetry, whatever, makes justice in the world. That's why it almost always has to be on the side of the underdog.

I might write four lines or I might write twenty. I subtract and I add until I really hit something I want to do. You don't always whittle down, sometimes you whittle up.

There is a long time in me between knowing and telling.

I'm seventy-five now. I also have the peculiar luck of having a sister and brother who are fourteen and sixteen years older than me. Their health is not good. It couldn't be at that age. But their spirits are. Both my brother and my sister are an example to me.

Paul Goodman was not ahead of his time but IN his time.

Sometimes before people know what they're saying, they already love the language.

Sometimes you find that what is most personal is also what connects you most strongly with others.