He would dream of discovering a magic optometrist from whom he would purchase a pair of green-tinged spectacles which would correct his regrettable myopia, and after that he would be able to see through the dense, blinding air to the fabulous world beneath.

All art began as sacred art, you know? I mean, all painting began as religious painting. All writing began as religious writing.

I've never had very high regard for therapists. I owe my health, my mental survival, to my friends and loved ones.

The act of migration puts into crisis everything about the migrating individual or group, everything about identity and selfhood and culture and belief. So if this is a novel about migration it must be that act of putting in question. It must perform the crisis it describes.

I grew up reading 'The Jungle Books' and loving them.

Islam is unusual in that it's the only one of the great world religions which was born inside recorded history. That there's an enormous amount of factual historical record about the life of a prophet and about social conditions in Arabia at that time. So it's possible to look at the origin of Islam in a scholarly way.

All my adult life, if I didn't have several hours a day to sit in a room by myself, I would get antsy and irritable.