People, no matter the economic class, find ways to feed their narcissism.

I've always liked elliptical writing, whether it's Kafka or Paula Fox, and I'm often bored by writers who explain too much. I think that becomes journalism. Mostly I don't try to explain to readers who somebody is - I just write about the somebody. I'm thinking through ideas. And I have the sense that, if you're reading this, you have some interest.

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

I write about what I'm thinking about. I write about what is bothering me or what is a political, aesthetic, or ethical issue or something, and then I figure out how to do it. I don't write essays that kind of just sustain one thought. I tend to move around because that's what I like.

It wasn't that I wanted to be an artist. But when I took my first drawing class with the painter Doug Ohlson, I could never finish a drawing.

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

Obviously the Internet makes everything easier - you get people's addresses and so on and everything seems much more accessible.