This [Thelonious Monk: The Life And Times Of An American Original] is another one of those books with the perfect blend of anecdote and analysis. The analysis is built into the anecdote. It has that right feel about it. It's not too scholarly, either.

I'm sure we're going to find out one day that the brain is as worthless as the appendix.

The things that I have loved have always been those extremes where there has been some kind of apocalypse in the person's life, and they come out unscathed or scathed.

It's weird. People want you to know that they write. They want you to know they're a musician, rather than making music or making stories. It's the strangest thing.

Most book things now (with a few exceptions) are just built around nice, safe books written for nice and safe book club readers. These are usually the books you see on display at Barnes and Noble. These Internet writers are like literary terrorists to me. They're training as we speak. They're getting ready to invade. They're building an army.

With my stuff, I think I've tried. I've been courted. I don't want to sound like an asshole, but I've been courted to be someone who could sell a lot of books.

New York exists for me. Not me for it.