Most of the time I don’t believe in God, but I always believe in the soul. When I say that I want to write about the experience of being human, I want to write about what it’s like to have a soul.
I do believe in that H.L. Mencken expression, “the politics of the horselaugh.” When you are describing things that are absurd, you laugh to keep from crying, in a certain way.
I think writers may be the canaries in the coal mine.
When we’re honest about ourselves, we’re usually met with a lot of love.
If I could only get rid of eyes — they’re always pools, or windows to the soul. If I could eliminate eyes, the world would be a better place.
Drugs are always going to be hot.
The built environment is seen as the depository of political events. But can we read and interpret events from images of trash and rubble?
The Oulipo has no interest in telling you which constraints you should focus on, or even that you should focus on constraints at all.
When you’re talking about extremophile life, it’s all relative: normal to them is not normal to us.
Because I’ve benefitted from it so much — being able to read people who write from this particular place, this in-between place — I think people like that deserve their own literature.