“If you write about the present it is very much more difficult to make things sound convincing. But writing about the past means that you are writing about a situation in which you know at least as much as anyone else.”

“You will learn more about writing from one hour of reading than you will in six hours of writing.”

“Nothing can be more limiting to the imagination than only writing about what you know”

“I don't care if the New York Times writes an obituary for me. I just want you to write one. ... You say you're not special because the world doesn't know about you, but that's an insult to me. I know about you.”

“...no good writing flows from a polluted well - you can write about monsters, but you can't be one...”

“Write it, damn you, write it! What else are you good for?”

“Good writing is always about things that are important to you, things that are scary to you, things that eat you up.”