You know how some people are upwardly mobile? I'm sort of downwardly mobile in the publishing world, because of my sales figures and also because of the kind of books I write. Everything really counts on sales. I started out with a bigger press, my first few books. But I've always done some things with independent and small presses and small magazines and I always will.

Now that I am conscious of the world of chronic pain, when I see somebody walking down the street who's having trouble, I feel a sadness for them. I notice.

I'm the author of my own misery.

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

If I have to work on something for too long, then it must be wrong. At a certain point, if I've worked on a sentence for about an hour, then I realize that it's probably not the right sentence and means I'm trying to make something fit that's ungainly.

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

Ulysses pissed me off. When Molly Bloom just says, "Yes I said yes I will Yes." And I'm thinking, You should be saying no, Molly. How about no? Saying no is great.