A peculiarity of the American historical sensibility allows us to be proud of great-grandfathers (or even grandfathers) who lived in crushing poverty, while the poverty of a father is too close for comfort.

Writing is so hard. And then, sometimes, it is so bewilderingly easy.

What is remembered is what becomes reality.

I come from people who have always been polite enough to feel that nothing has ever happened to them.

poetry is the sung voice of accurate perception.

The real subject of autobiography is not one's experience but one's consciousness. Memoirists use the self as a tool.

The world is full of mystery but it must not be choked with secrets: we must talk to one another.