In writing you work toward a result you won't see for years, and can't be sure you'll ever see. It takes stamina and self-mastery and faith. It demands those things of you, then gives them back with a little extra, a surprise to keep you coming. It toughens you and clears your head. I could feel it happening. I was saving my life with every word I wrote, and I knew it.

There's a joy in writing short stories, a wonderful sense of reward when you pull certain things off.

I was giving up--being realistic, as people liked to say, meaning the same thing. Being realistic made me feel bitter.

I love Chekhov. I could go on all day about him.

There are writers who do start doing the same thing again and again and almost inevitably fall into self-parody.

You don't teach information in a writing workshop.

You have to be kind of clued into them, they are a world of their own, and most people find them disappointing because the best short stories are not constructed like novels.