The anger and fear are so global. And of course, we live where we live and there's a hierarchy to who is worth what. It's been going on for a long, l….

I can't say that I love writing, but I do love the satisfaction that it gives me..

If New York is the City That Never Sleeps, then Los Angeles is the City That's Always Passed Out on the Couch..

All this angst, all this stuff we all feel, is just tied to making art. It's so ancient..

Maybe I'm just sensitive to that person who's on the outside..

I try to be accommodating, but I'm pretty much a loner..

Contradictions make people feel off. They'll say, "Hey, you just said this and now this person is doing that, how is that possible?".

Even when it comes to writing fiction, how do you encompass all this stuff that's right on the tip of your tongue? You have to fold that into what yo….

I'm doing all these interviews with the British press, the Italian press, and others. They all want to talk about this stuff. I don't have a stance; ….

It's just never the same. At least for me.It's probably because it's just who I am, I never know what that [truth] is. It's so momentary to go, "Oh, ….

People are very comfortable when race relations get looked at retrospectively. Slavery, the civil rights movement, etc..

If all the world's a stage, I want to operate the trap door..

I'm not very pious about anything, fortunately, but I'm skewering myself first. I'm skewering things that I care about and things that are important ….

I'm hugely honored [with the Man Booker Prize]..

The thing is that it's always a constant reminder of how violent this country has been, always has been, you know. I'm still frustrated with these co….

Why are the mainstream buzz things rarely contemporary? It doesn't happen very often. It's hard to feel culpable or implicated or even apathetic..

It's weird because there is progress somehow. But there's so much that just feels the same. How important is that rank? How important is it that I am….

It makes me think about how you hear these young people say, "I see you, man." Or even if you go and watch some basketball game over the summer and t….

I forget how beautiful and calm California is. It's not so much about the place, but also the age that I came to the place and, well, other things. N….

I co-taught a seminar called Small Group Processes with my professor. I learned so much from it, so much about myself, about groups, how this stuff w….

I think, and a lot of that has to do with where I grew up in California; [status] isn't something I think about that much..