I Try Not To Think

A Female Writer Does Definitely Get More Attention If She Writes About Male Characters. It's True. It's Considered Somehow More Literary, In The Same Way That It's More Literary To Write About Supposedly Male Subjects, Such As War. You're Considered More Seriously By The Literary Establishment.

As With Most Of My Work, I Started From The Abstract, From Research, Building An Intellectual Model That Slowly Became Internalized When The Characters Came Alive. It's Fascinating What Happens To The Model You've So Assiduously Assembled When Characters Are Allowed To Run Rampant: Things You Thought Essential Are Broken And Other Things Are Vastly Improved.

Who, In The Midst Of Passion, Is Vigilant Against Illness? Who Listens To The Reports Of Recently Decimated Populations In Spain, India, Bora Bora, When New Lips, Tongues And Poems Fill The World?

At Least In My Case, A Very Simple, Regular, Happy Life Makes For Better Writing.

In Terms Of Writing, I Think What Most Fiction Writers Treasure More Than Anything Is The Feeling That They're Living For The Length Of A Book Inside Another Person.