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.
Naturally, we thought we were all brilliant — that we were geniuses, that this great success was a consequence of our innate quality. Of course, this was merely a consequence of a very good market situation.
You don’t have to make a case for fiction, you just have to make great fiction.