“I am influenced by words and the chewiness of language”
“I am not above the influence, I am not below it, I am the influence.”
“I have heard no word of my own language; I am rendered dumb.”
“I felt Joyce was an influence on my fiction, but in a very general way, as a kind of inspiration and a model for the beauty of language. ”
“Language is a skin: I rub my language against the other. It is as if I had words instead of fingers, or fingers at the tip of my words. My language trembles with desire.”
“I am influenced by every second of my waking hour. ”