The monotony of staying in one place is the best thing for writing a novel. Having regular habits, a kind of security, but especially no big surprises, no shocks.

Notice how many of the Olympic athletes effusively thanked their mothers for their success? “She drove me to my practice at four in the morning,” etc. Writing is not figure skating or skiing. Your mother will not make you a writer. My advice to any young person who wants to write is: leave home.

Even if I were traveling with you, your trip would not be mine.

Unless there is a strong sense of place there is no travel writing, but it need not come from topographical description; dialogue can also convey a sense of place. Even so, I insist, the traveler invents the place. Feeling compelled to comment on my travel books, people say to me, "I went there"---China, India, the Pacific, Albania-- "and it wasn't like that." I say, "Because I am not you.

You can't write about a friend, you can only write about a former friend.

One of the pleasures of reading is seeing this alteration on the pages, and the way, by reading it, you have made the book yours.

Extensive traveling induces a feeling of encapsulation, and travel, so broadening at first, contracts the mind.