That is the mystery: Reading Henry James can yield prose that is contrary to James, yet inspired by him. Who can understand this?

My belief is that art should not be comforting; for comfort, we have mass entertainment and one another. Art should provoke, disturb, arouse our emotions, expand our sympathies in directions we may not anticipate and may not even wish.

My first love was reading, which inspired me to write.

Mark Twain was very unhappy with himself for various reasons. He was very unhappy with America of this time. He thought it was terrible we had no anti-lynching laws, and he was also a feminist, and he was also very concerned with anti-Semitism. He was a good man, but he was hard on himself.

The only people who claim that money is not important are people who have enough money so that they are relieved of the ugly burden of thinking about it.

The appeal of writing is primarily the investigation of mystery.

Before you can write a novel you have to have a number of ideas that come together. One idea is not enough.