I think it's true that unless human beings experience something, they simply don't understand what people are going through.

When I'm choosing things, there's a level of intelligence I want to peel off, whether it's written in terribly simple sentences, whether it's from the point of view of a dog, or a 15-year-old boy.

Being in Europe had helped me unlearn some of what I'd been taught or unconsciously believed.

I'm very interested in animal behavior, and the relationship of human beings to other animal behavior.

The literary world is more time-traveling than the art world, and novelty is much more important in art than it is in writing.

People are less focused on the story, and more on how the story is told.

The Dutch and the English, former competitors for world dominance, taught me the wisdom of waiting as well as withholding.