One of the weird things about L.A. is that there's always a set of negative perceptions that attaches itself to this city.

I heard a story the other night about an editor who visited the Iowa Workshop and, when asked what sorts of books she published, replied, "Classic books." One of the students asked her, "You mean like Kafka?" Apparently she said, "Oh, I don't think I would publish Kafka."

The novelist is frequently considered to be an impediment.

I don't want to say that having power is overrated, but powerlessness can give rise to a different kind of authority, and that's the kind of authority that writes books.

I think it's what fiction is for: to illuminate that gap between our secret selves and our more visible and apparent ones.

I thought, writing is everything, it's so much more important than this or that. If only I could give that young man a stern talking to. Having a child changes things quite a bit.

These are the kind of movies that only a real apparatchik, someone who thinks that corporations are people, could love.