“Keeing busy" is the remedy for all the ills in America. It's also the means by which the creative impulse is destroyed.”

“It’s up to the writer and the artist to give voice to these people. There are two impulses in art: one is rebellious and transgressive—you explore regions in which you are not wanted, and you will be punished for that. But the other is a way of sympathy—evoking sympathy for people who may be different from us—whom we don’t know. Art is a way of breaking down the barriers between people—these two seemingly antithetical impulses toward rebellion and toward sympathy come together in art.”

“Boxing has become America's tragic theater. ”

“Reading is the sole means by which we slip, involuntarily, often helplessly, into another's skin, another's voice, another's soul.”

“Storytelling is shaped by two contrary, yet complementary, impulses—one toward brevity, compactness, artful omission; the other toward expansion, amplification, enrichment.”

“Which is why we say I can't live without you meaning your life gives life to me, who am otherwise an empty vessel, nameless.”

“To the west, the Pacific Ocean, which revulses me, for its vastness cannot be fitted into any box.”