If you just sit there, and you're a writer, you're bound to write crap. A lot of American writing is crap. And a lot of American writers are professionals.

Often the lines that define the traditional European arrangement of fiction, non-fiction, history, etc. are not useful. These lines can distort the world we, people who look like me, live in - and by the world, I mean our personal experience of it.

All of these declarations of what writing ought to be, which I had myself-though, thank God I had never committed them to paper-I think are nonsense. You write what you write, and then either it holds up or it doesn't hold up. There are no rules or particular sensibilities. I don't believe in that at all anymore.

I didn't know it was possible to be successful as a writer, so I wasn't afraid to fail.

People only say I’m angry because I’m black and I’m a woman.

I'm trying to earn a living in the way that is most enjoyable to me. I love the world of literature, and I hope to support myself in it.

None of us seem to think that we should draw a line under what would be a satisfactory amount of wealth.