I write fiction longhand. That's not so much about rejecting technology as being unable to write fiction on a computer for some reason. I don't think I would write it on a typewriter either. I write in a very blind gut instinctive way. It just doesn't feel right. There's a physical connection. And then in nonfiction that's not the case at all. I can't even imagine writing nonfiction by hand.

I'm always happy," Sasha said. "Sometimes I just forget.

I had this idea that I could hire myself out as a person to go on archeological digs and dig, without any training! I actually wrote to a number of archeology departments and offered up my services.

Because you can't write habitually and well all the time, you have to be willing to write badly. That's how you get the regularity that enables you to be present for the good stuff.

I wonder what Proust would have made of our present-day locus of collective fantasy, the Internet. I’m guessing he would have seized on its wistful aspect, pointing out gently and with wry humor that much of what beguiles us is the act of reaching for what isn’t there.

There's a fine line between thinking about somebody and thinking about not thinking about somebody, but I have the patience and the self-control to walk that line for hours - days, if I have to.

Americans are less selfish than some of our politicians believe and will respond with reason and resilience to passionate clarity.