Writers end up writing stories-or rather, stories' shadows-and they're grateful if they can, but it is not enough. Nothing the writer can do is ever enough

Of course there is nothing that cannot be done incorrectly.

Good writing never soothes or comforts. It is no prescription, neither is it diversionary, although it can and should enchant while it explodes in the reader's face.

I think the writer has to be responsible to signs and dreams. If you don't do anything with it, you lose it.

Writers are like eremites or anchorites - natural-born eremites or anchorites - who seem puzzled as to why they went up the pole or into the cave in the first place.

I believe in guilt. There's not enough guilt around these days for my taste.

The story knows itself better than the writer does at some point, knows what's being said before the writer figures out how to say it.