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" One of the reasons I've been able to be productive is that I want to do everything. "

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" What is your identity, and how do you know who you are if you don't have language? "

" Science has killed religion. There's no hope for the future with seven billion of us on the planet, and the only thing you can do is to laugh in the face of it all. "

" Life is tragic and absurd, and none of it has any purpose at all. "

" I'm just kind of fascinated by how we can deny that we are animals and what our impact on the other animals is like, and how quixotic we can be in trying to assess what we've done in trying to correct it. "

" It's hard to say how certain stories just punch us in the heart and the brain at the same time at the end. I suppose that's what we're all looking for. But each story has its own valence, its own way of saying goodbye to you. "

" You want, as an artist, to be pushing yourself to do what you haven't done before. "

" I like to live in my own mind, regardless of everyone and everything, working out the intimate puzzles that are my stories and novels. "

" I read widely - for news, the arts, science, for entertainment, and the value of being informed - and, as a fiction writer, I can't help transposing what I learn into the scenario for a novel or story. "

" If we lose sight of the fact that writing is entertainment, then writing is doomed. "

" I'm not looking ahead joyfully to the rest of my life or the future of the human race. I've always written about man as an animal species among other animals, competing for limited resources. Our population is exploding. Our environment is dying. Science has debunked God. "

" As humans, we all want our own island. Of course, the truth is, we're never going to get it. "

" I think, if I'm doing my job correctly, I'm presenting a scenario for you as the reader to engage with on your own. I mean, that's what the best art is supposed to do. It's not supposed to be political. I think if you read all my books, you know where I stand, pretty much. "

" I've always written about heroes and wondered who they are. "

" I'm enslaved to writing to the point where I sacrifice almost everything else. "

" I think the way to be a writer is to experience things, certainly, and be open to things, but at some point to become dedicated to the craft of writing and to create a stable environment for that writing to occur in. "

" This is why fiction is an art, and life is not - how much more affecting is the lie than the truth. "

" Sometimes if something is entertaining and amusing, people tend to think that it doesn't have the depth of something that's dramatic. I don't think that's true. "

" I worry about everything in the world, and it's just too much for anybody to think about, so I have my art as my consolation. "

" I really like the power of stopping the laughter and turning it to horror. "

" It's true that none of my characters are admirable. But maybe I'm primarily a satirist, and a satirist needs to hold up what's not admirable. "

" I don't care if the audience is 600 Saul Bellows; I'm going to knock them dead with a comedy routine. I'm out there as a missionary for literature because, if people laugh and enjoy themselves, they might actually do something as bizarre as reading the book. "

" The beauty of American law is you cannot slander anybody who is dead. This is not true in all countries. "

" I never go anywhere without a book for fear of being stuck in line in front of the theater or strapped down in the dentist's chair and being bored witless. Thus, I read everywhere. "

" I am mad for nature writing. I want to get inside the head of every creature in the world, even ants. "

" I've never really been met with indifference, where they say, 'Who cares?' I think that's what good art is supposed to do. It's not supposed to make you feel good about your own prejudices and your own values; it's supposed to open you up in some way and get you outraged or make you happy or make you sad or whatever it's going to do. "

" Look at Sam Beckett. Most depressed man who ever lived, but he sure was funny. "

" Books are up against TV and movies and video games and a multimedia society that is so busy that people don't have contemplative time any more. I worry deeply about this. In fact, I worry about everything all the time. I used to be a punk. All I wanted to do was tear everything down, and that was so much easier. "

" I think that's what art is about: to provoke you. It helps me make sense of a senseless universe because I become the god of the story. I create it, and I see it in all its lineaments in my own way and can control it - in a world in which everything else is out of control. "

" Sometimes, we find common ground; more often, we don't. "

" The novel is a seduction; a reader has to be seduced. "