There is a wonderful intelligence to the unconscious. It’s always smarter than we are.

For almost anyone who chooses to be a writer, since so very few writers are able to learn a living from their work that is equivalent to the living earned by the average dentist or accountant.

And there are people who want to be writers because they love to write. And they care.

We are the planet, fully as much as water, earth, fire and air are the planet, and if the planet survives, it will only be through heroism. Not occasional heroism, a remarkable instance of it here and there, but constant heroism, systematic heroism, heroism as governing principle.

The best thing about writing programs is that it rationalized the apprenticeship of a writer.

It's hard to spend years at a time working in total solitude with no reality-check.

My major allegiance has been to storytelling, not to history.