Writing! The activity for which the only adequate bribe is the possibility of suicide, one day.

The greatest works of literature seem to embody both "art" and "morality".

I think it's very important for writers and artists generally to be witnesses to the world, and to be transparent. To let other people speak... to travel... to experience the world. And memorialize it.

Anyone who teaches knows that you don't really experience a text until you've taught it, in loving detail, with an intelligent and responsive class.

The challenge is to resist circumstances. Any idiot can be happy in a happy place, but moral courage is required to be happy in a hellhole.

Night comes to the desert all at once, as if someone turned off the light.

Keeing busy" is the remedy for all the ills in America. It's also the means by which the creative impulse is destroyed.