If you want to write fiction, the best thing you can do is take two aspirins, lie down in a dark room, and wait for the feeling to pass.

Why on earth should I care whether people read me with their eyes or their ears?

The short story, I should point out, is perforce a labor of love in today's literary world; there's precious little economic incentive to write one.

New York is an ugly city, a dirty city... But there is one thing about it. Once you have lived in New York and it has become your home, no place else is good enough.

I’ve tried writing and the sentences come out fine, but I write a few pages and I don’t want to go on.

Something I learned long ago. It is not necessary to know what a person is afraid of. It is enough to know the person is afraid.

One thing that helps is to give myself permission to write badly. I tell myself that I'm going to do my five or 10 pages no matter what, and that I can always tear them up the following morning if I want. I'll have lost nothing-writing and tearing up five pages would leave me no further behind than if I took the day off.