History Is The Lies Of The Victors.

Great Books Are Readable Anyway. Dickens Is Readable. Jane Austen Is Readable. John Updike's Readable. Hawthorne's Readable. It's A Meaningless Term. You Have To Go The Very Extremes Of Literature, Like Joyce's "finnegan's Wake," Before You Get A Literary Work That Literally Unreadable.

Is Any Novelist Going To Recognize The Moment When He Or She Has Nothing More To Say? It Is A Brave Thing To Admit. And Since As A Professional Writer You Are Full Of Anxiety Anyway, You Could Easily Misread The Signs.

The Writer Has Little Control Over Personal Temperament, None Over Historical Moment, And Is Only Partly In Charge Of His Or Her Own Aesthetic.

I'm A Novelist, So I Can't Write About Ideas Unless They're Attached To People.

I Had Wanted Life Not To Bother Me Too Much, And Had Succeeded - And How Pitiful That Was.