People are very comfortable when race relations get looked at retrospectively. Slavery, the civil rights movement, etc.

My good friend, the poet Kofi Natambu, once said, "Contradiction is how we operate."

In White Boy Shuffle, I combined my seventh-grade teacher, Mr. Takemoto, who really saved me - I don't think I've ever told anyone this - and my first basketball coach, Mr. Shimizu, into one character. Something about the way they talked about things, and their attitudes, had a huge impact on me. Not that I necessarily agreed with them. It was important to me to just put them there to stay grounded.

People are very comfortable when race relations get looked at retrospectively. Slavery, the civil rights movement, etc.

I've written a little bit in Germany.

I think there's nothing new going on. Except that, you're even more public than you've ever been.There's some good and some bad to that.

If all the students who slept through lectures were laid end to end, they'd all be a lot more comfortable. If all the world's a stage, I want to operate the trap door.