If writing seems hard, it's because it is hard. It's one of the hardest things people do.

Probably every subject is interesting if an avenue into it can be found that has humanity and that an ordinary person can follow.

Writers can write to affirm and to celebrate, or they can write to debunk and destroy; the choice is ours.

Clear thinking becomes clear writing; one can't exist without the other.

But nothing has replaced the writer. He or she is still stuck with the same old job of saying something that other people will want to read.

Even a poor translator couldn't kill a style that moves with such narrative clarity.

A writer is obviously at his most natural and relaxed when he writes in the first person. Writing is a personal transaction between two people, conducted on paper, and the transaction will go well to the extent that it retains its humanity.