As Writers We Must, From Our Very

The Vestibule Door Opens Onto A June Morning So Fine And Scrubbed Classira Pauses At The Threshold As She Would At The Edge Of A Pool, Watching The Turquoise Water Lapping At The Tiles, The Liquid Nets Of Sun Wavering In The Blue Depths. As If Standing At The Edge Of A Pool She Delays For A Moment The Plunge, The Quick Membrane Of Chill, The Plain Shock Of Immersion.

A Certain Slightly Cruel Disregard For The Feelings Of Living People Is Simply Part Of The Package. I Think A Writer, If Hes Any Good, Is Not An Entirely Benign Entity In The World.

I Just Don't Feel Much Interested In The Lifestyles Of The Rich And Famous.

A Stray Fact: Insects Are Not Drawn To Candle Flames, They Are Drawn To The Light On The Far Side Of The Flame, They Go Into The Flame And Sizzle To Nothingness Because They're So Eager To Get To The Light On The Other Side.

Maybe It’s Not, In The End, The Virtues Of Others That So Wrenches Our Hearts As It Is The Sense Of Almost Unbearably Poignant Recognition When We See Them At Their Most Base, In Their Sorrow And Gluttony And Foolishness. You Need The Virtues, Too—some Sort Of Virtues—but We Don’t Care About Emma Bovary Or Anna Karenina Or Raskolnikov Because They’re Good. We Care About Them Because They’re Not Admirable, Because They’re Us, And Because Great Writers Have Forgiven Them For It.