Writer

A creative writing program is only as good as its teachers, and I was fortunate in having two great writers as mentors.

Most of the people I write about have been ambitious outlanders who have been attracted to New York from other parts of the world.

You know, Greenwich Village was the traditional bohemia of New York. I wish I could say that was entirely true now. It's, uh... changed. It's now got, God help us, investment bankers and journalists, but it's still a very beautiful part of New York.

There's a socialist bias to the consensus of the literary world: a '30s mentality that says factory workers are more worthy of our attention.

I like the fact that I'm living in the world rather than in a university.

It's the cynics who never get married.

It's the cynics who never get married.

There aren't many shy writers left.

Anybody who becomes a movie star becomes successful at projecting a certain image to the public.

Eat, drink and remarry is my motto.

'Socialist' is the nastiest thing you can say about an American politician in some quarters.

I don't want to have my life fall apart for my work.

There aren't many shy writers left.

The definition of gumbo is almost as slippery as that of Creole. Just as gumbo can contain pretty much any kind of meat or seafood, Creole is a vague and inclusive term for native New Orleanians, who may be black or white, depending on whom you're asking.

We've been hearing about the death of the novel ever since the day after Don Quixote was published.

I think a lot of the people who write about me think that if they had to write fewer interviews then they would transcribe their life-story and it would be a big success. Or should be.

There's a socialist bias to the consensus of the literary world: a '30s mentality that says factory workers are more worthy of our attention.

Mine is not an autonomous imagination.

I certainly think that the publishing houses have to learn more about this informal network of literary blogging and get over the idea that sending an author on a book tour - to Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles - is a successful model anymore.

I'm a romantic; you have to be to marry four times.