Run a hand through your hair, like the white boys do, even though the only thing that runs easily through your hair is Africa.

If you, like, consciously think about being cool, you're not cool. If you consciously think about being, like, different or original, you ain't different or original.

Sadness at being caught, at the incontrovertibe knowledge that she will never forgive you.

I just want some space to myself every now and then. Every time I’m with you I have this sense that you want something from me.

I can't imagine anybody who ends up being an artist who didn't pass through a time of geekiness.

You're Dominican only if you do this, this, and that. And if you do this and that, you'll be accepted to a certain degree and if you don't, people will scorn you for it.

But it's clear to me that us slow-poke writers are a dying breed. It's amazing how thoroughly my young writing students have internalized the new machine rhythm, the rush many of my young writers are in to publish. The majority don't want to sit on a book for four, five years. The majority don't want to listen to the silence inside and outside for their artistic imprimatur. The majority want to publish fast, publish now.