Fear is your best friend or your worst enemy. It's like fire. If you can control it, it can cook for you; it can heat your house. If you can't control it, it will burn everything around you and destroy you. If you can control your fear, it makes you more alert, like a deer coming across the lawn.

Most writers, in my opinion, are dysfunctional derelicts.

Some people are faster than others; I'm just figuring it out later, that's all. I'm getting smart too late and old too soon.

I try my best to learn from other people's mistakes. I have a lot of respect for people who can change.

[Sometimes I] put on a ski mask and dress in old clothes, go out on the streets and beg for quarters.

I like the hip writers: Fitzgerald, the guy who committed suicide, Hemingway, all those guys. Some of them were alcoholics and drug addicts but they had fun. They were real people. They formed the culture of American literature. Hemingway admired Tolstoy, Tolstoy admired Pushkin, and Mailer admired Hemingway. It all flows down. The greats are all connected. One day I'm gonna write a book myself. The first chapter will be about what a rough deal my momma got. She believed in you guys and your society.

Hard times fall upon everybody. Whatever it is, we're going to get out of it.