That is one more reason why I write in English only right now. I prefer writing in the language I hear around me for the people by whom I am surrounded.

I've done a lot of going back and forth with my own writing, in particular translating my English language stuff into Ukrainian - poetry as well as prose. But I actually hate doing it. It is a thankless, mind-numbing process, additionally unpleasant for me because it reminds me of my ambiguous status of not belonging anywhere.

That is one more reason why I write in English only right now. I prefer writing in the language I hear around me for the people by whom I am surrounded.

Imagination is so much more fertile than life.

In fact, the very phrase "teaching creative writing" sounds to me oxymoronic. How can you teach someone to be creative?

I was always creatively stubborn, adverse to editing by others, and wanted to use the kind of Ukrainian we spoke among ourselves rather than the more artificial prescribed literary Ukrainian. The problem was the greatest in prose, where editors would change my language because "it sounded better this way." My poetry they left alone probably out of deference to that hallowed genre.

I feel that other people's suggestions are very dangerous. Yet, I can't say that they are always destructive or not useful. Perhaps, rather than having other people tell you how you should improve your work, they should just tell you how they understand your work, what they got out of it, so that you can figure out yourself if what you did was right or wrong.