The 20th century saw far greater catastrophes than September 11th, as bad as it was, and they didn't render literature or art or music irrelevant. In fact, I think that literature and art help us to understand - sometimes they provide narratives and metaphors for understanding history, for understanding recent catastrophes.

You described the feeling you’d always had of being misplaced, of always standing to one side of yourself, of watching yourself in the world even as you were being in the world, and wondering if this was how everyone felt. That you always believed that other people had a clearer idea of what they were doing, and didn’t worry quite so much about why.

Your presence here is is only a matter of conducting an experiment in limits, reminding yourself of what you aren’t.

I like the fact that I'm living in the world rather than in a university.

A creative writing program is only as good as its teachers, and I was fortunate in having two great writers as mentors.

Your heartbreak is just another version of the same old story.

A modest critique of an age in which an actor is the President, in which fashion models are asked for their opinions, in which getting into a nightclub is seen as a significant human achievement.