I went to college to study hospitality. I quickly got out of that and realized that what I liked to do was write.

The thing about being a writer is that you never have to ask, 'Am I doing something that's worthwhile?' Because even if you fail at it, you know that it's worth doing.

The ways in which things are superficially similar but also distinct is interesting to me.

Writing is the only thing I've ever done with persistence, except for being married.

Married life requires shared mystery even when all the facts are known.

Something will be there when the flood recedes. We know that. It will be those people now standing in the water, and on those rooftops - many black, many poor. Homeless. Overlooked. And it will be New Orleans - though its memory may be shortened, its self-gaze and eccentricity scoured out so that what's left is a city more like other cities, less insular, less self-regarding, but possibly more self-knowing after today. A city on firmer ground.

I wouldn't be a very good writer if someone hadn't taught me how to read.