Find what causes a commotion in your heart. Find a way to write about that.
Literature should not be exclusive, it should be inclusive. My general view is that you can’t, based on your own experience, project what a book will do for someone else. That’s why I don’t review books.
I know you can dream your way through an otherwise fine life, and never wake up, which is what I almost did.
Writing is the only thing I’ve ever done with persistence, except for being married.
Our ex-wifes always harbour secrets about us that make them irresistable. Until, of course, we remember who we are and what we did and why we are not married anymore.
What was our life like? I almost don’t remember now. Though I remember it, the space of time it occupied. And I remember it fondly.
Things happen when people are not where they belong, and the world moves forward and back by that principle.
Maturity, as I conceived it, was recognizing what was bad or peculiar in life, admitting it has to stay that way, and going ahead with the best of things.
The thing about being a writer is that you never have to ask, ‘Am I doing something that’s worthwhile?’ Because even if you fail at it, you know that it’s worth doing.
I’m trying to cause people to be interested in the particulars of their lives because I think that’s one thing literature can do for us. It can say to us: pay attention. Pay closer attention. Pay stricter attention to what you say to your son.
