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" When I'm working on a book, I try to do eight pages a week. That seems like a good amount. Less than that, I'm not getting a nice momentum, and more than that, I'm probably putting out too much crap. "

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" Once I got to college, it seemed that the Hamptons were a little bit too posh for me and didn't represent the kind of values I was embracing in my late teens. So, I didn't go out there, except to visit my parents, for a long time. And then, after 9/11, I discovered it was a nice, mellow place to hang out. "

Colson Whitehead

Time

College

" Some people don't like my fiction, because they prefer the nonfiction. But moving around keeps the work fresh for me and, hopefully, for my one or two readers who follow me from book to book! "

Colson Whitehead

Work

" Zombies are a great rhetorical prop to talk about people and paranoia, and they are a good vehicle for my misanthropy. "

" I write at home. I like to be able to take a nap, watch TV, make a sandwich, and if I wake up and don't feel like working, I'm not going to bang my head on my desk all day: I'll go out and do something else. "

" People don't like it when you compare the miracle of childbirth to writing a book, but I think there is some overlap in the two because they are both pure agony. "

" The contemporary casino is more than a gambling destination: it is a multifarious pleasure enclosure intended to satisfy every member of the family unit. "

" I started writing in the '90s, so I was free to just have an eccentric career and not conform to some idea of what a black writer has to do. I didn't have the burden of representation. "

" Usually, when I write a novel, it takes me about 100 pages to figure out the voice of the narrator. "

Colson Whitehead

Write

Voice

" I was sort of a miserable teenager. "

" I try to have each book be an antidote to the one before. "

" I'm just trying to keep things rich for me creatively and for the readers who follow me. "

" Some books are well-received with critics; other books sell. "

" Access to information, to music or any kind of culture, is getting faster and faster and more streamlined. At each juncture, people are thrown into tumult and have to adapt or die. "

" There's always an attack on the sophomore novel from some quarters. "

" I knew that a zombie book would not particularly appeal to some of my previous readers, but it was artistically compelling, and being able to do a short nonfiction book about poker was really fun and great. "

" I'm raising kids, and so much of American culture sustains me and gives me things to think about and work on. "

Colson Whitehead

American

Culture

" In the 1930s, the government paid writers to interview 80- and 90-year-old former slaves, and I read those accounts. I came away realizing - not surprisingly - that many slave masters were sadists who spent a lot of time thinking up creative ways of hurting people. "

" I usually have two or three ideas floating around. When I have free time, the one I end up thinking most about is the one I end up pursuing. "

" I have a good poker face because I am half-dead inside. "

" In America, when you hear about the Underground Railroad, it's so evocative. You think it's a literal subway for a few minutes before your teacher goes on and describes where it actually was. "

" My mom's mother was from Virginia, but I don't feel much of a tie. I'm very much anti-South for many, many reasons. Whenever I go down there, people are always looking at me funny, you know. "

" 'Zone One' has one kind of an apocalypse, and 'The Underground Railroad' another. In both cases, the narrators are animated by a hope in a better place of refuge - in the last surviving human outpost, Up North. Does it exist? They can only believe. "

" I use New York to talk about home, but the ideas in 'Colossus' could be transferred to other cities. The story about Central Park is really about the first day of spring in any park. The Coney Island chapter is really about beaches and summer and heat waves. "

" A lot of my books have started with an abstract premise. "

" I love getting out of the Q train at Union Square. It's such a mix of people, like a party. There's always an errand you can do along there, whether it's picking up contacts or buying poker chips. "

" Stephen King in general, as well as films of the apocalypse from the '70s, had a big influence on 'Zone One.' "

" I think a joke is a form of truth-telling. A good joke that's absurd contains elements of our daily darkness and also a possibility to escape that darkness. So, for me, humor is an attempt to capture everyday tragedy and everyday hopeful moments that we experience all of the time. "

" I grew up reading the 'Village Voice' and wanting to be one of these multidisciplinary music writers, film writers, book writers. And I lucked out getting a job at the 'Voice' right after college. "

" I take inspiration from books, movies, television, music - it all goes in the hopper. Depending on the project, I'm drawing from this or that piece of art that has stayed with me. Toni Morrison, George Romero, Sonic Youth - they are all in there. "

Colson Whitehead

Art

Drawing

" I wanted to be one of these multidisciplinary critics who is doing music one day, TV the next, and books the next. "

Colson Whitehead

Books

Day