The fallacy is that you have to hold some sort of stake in the grief or horror in order to write about it - I think the opposite is true.

You have to attempt to find new forms that will force you to write freshly and better and hopefully more truthfully.

I had some bad jobs when I was young. Writing is not one of them. If you're fortunate enough to reach my age, to still be writing, you have to be grateful, and I am. I've been lucky. For many years, all I've done is writing, and it's all I've ever wanted to do.

I'm afraid a lot of people have lost a lot of money over the years betting on me.

We have a very foolish notion in Western countries that progress delivers freedom. But progress doesn't necessarily bring moral virtue.

What reality was ever made by realists?

I think sometimes writers must attempt to communicate the incommunicable, because, whether they wish it or not, they're the ones to whom it falls.