I learned a lot from Arthur Rimbaud. People talk about how he wanted to be a seer and do that through the derangement of the senses. What they forget was that he also advocated, sternly and austerely, that one must be able to go through all that - and then articulate it.

If I'm really working on something, writing or painting or really concentrating, I don't even think about brushing my hair.

I watch a lot of crime shows. The head investigator always said to the crime solver, "What do you say?" And inevitably the other has to say something like, "Well I'm thinking he was shot in the neck with a certain gun and he seemed to be running." The solver has to picture what he's seeing first, and then express his own observations. The writer does the same.

We learned we wanted too much. We could only give from the perspective of who we were and what we had. Apart, we were able to see with even greater clarity that we didn’t want to be without each other.

What I really like is an intelligent review. It doesn't have to be positive. A review that has some kind of insight, and sometimes people say something that's startling or is so poignant.

I got over the loss of his desk and chair, but never the desire to produce a string of words more precious than the emeralds of Cortés.

Sure I destroyed my guitar at every concert, but it was okay, because I'd always get a shiny new one the very next day.