There's something about a parenthesis in fiction that puts one off, saying, "It's me, moi, jumping in now."

There's something about a parenthesis in fiction that puts one off, saying, "It's me, moi, jumping in now."

Obscenities are too often used for shock value, as a kind of shorthand for real expression of emotion. You've got to scale down your monstrosities. A scream is not a discovery.

A short story is a writer's way of thinking through experience... Journalism aims at accuracy, but fiction's aim is truth. The writer distorts reality in the interest of a larger truth.

Uninvited criticism is insult.

Nothing on earth in fiction is less interesting than characters under the influence of alcohol.

Sometimes, in that darkness, there is a single act of love, some selfless gesture, an aspiration, and we see that it's not been all waste, all hopeless, and we can ... well ... go on.