If you have value as an artist it's probably going to be in your capacity to let things inside you get past things that are placed there to keep you from telling the truth. The more you see things as clearly and coldly as you can, the more value you're going to have.

When I was younger, I used to be very impatient with anyone who wasn't doing overtly political work. I've since come to feel that some writers have an appetite or a need for the political, for political discourse, for historical political subjects.

People shouldn't trust artists and they shouldn't trust art. Part of the fun of art is that it invites you to interpret it.

In a sense, I feel like the job of the artist at all times is essentially the same, which is simply to tell the truth. I mean, I'm nervous about any prescriptions for what a writer should or shouldn't do.

I've always been drawn to writing historical characters. The best stories are the ones you find in history.

Torture yourself about your failures. And then get back to work.

Justice precedes beauty. Without justice, beauty is impossible, an obscenity. And when beauty has gone, what does a cameraman do with his eye?