The novel doesn't come into existence until certain methods of reproducing fiction come along.

Cooper wrote a novel which is absolutely indistinguishable from Austen, completely from a female point of view, completely English, no sense that he was an American.

To be an American (unlike being English or French or whatever) is precisely to imagine a destiny rather than to inherit one; since we have always been, insofar as we are Americans at all, inhabitants of myth rather than history.

It's funny to be a critic.

My assignment is what every writer's assignment is: tell the truth of his own time.

I gave up writing blurbs because you make one friend and 200 enemies.

Raymond Carver is good. I think he'll be appreciated more and more. He's an easy writer to imitate.