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

I'm interested in reality but I'm not interested in realism at all.

People in the upper classes can just as easily be indifferent to their own body, or treat themselves as badly, as people who don't have the money. There are always differences among differences.

It's true you have to screen out a lot living in the city. I stayed away from New York for a long time after college, and when I was first back, I'd read The Village Voice and feel like I was having a panic attack.

For me, the experience of not living in America was recognizing that I was American. You don't think about yourself being so culturally encoded, so nationally stamped; you don't discover that when you're a tourist for a month. You see how you reflect the place you're from. When I came back from living in Europe, I was very struck by how I didn't see America as the center of the world in the same way. It's very easy to slip back because America is so powerful. But any place you live is the center of the world.

Kafka wrote the great line: "my education has damaged me in ways I do not even know." And that's always been a signature motto for me.

Reading gave me great comfort and pleasure. When I started being able to write, around seven or eight, I wanted to be able to do that myself, to create that other world.