I feel like I sort of missed the eighties. At the time, we didn’t know we were having fun, which is probably the way it always is.

- Tama Janowitz

The novel is never really in the first draft. The novel really happens in the revisions.

- Tama Janowitz

In my writing I wanted to be liked for writing really unlikeable stuff. There were books that people, particularly women, hated so much. They said, "…

- Tama Janowitz

Most of my life is just spent lying in bed. I mean, it's enough pressure to write the words. Do I need to use the additional energy exerted by sittin…

- Tama Janowitz

With publicity comes humiliation.

- Tama Janowitz

I was like a social worker for lepers. My clients had a chunk of their body they wanted to give away; for a price I was there to receive it.

- Tama Janowitz

I think powerful women don't care whether or not they're liked.

- Tama Janowitz

On bad days, I think I'd like to be a plastic surgeon who goes to Third World countries and operates on children in villages with airlifts, and then …

- Tama Janowitz

Why would I want to read something about somebody that's just a really nice, decent person who overcomes terrible trials? That's not how life is to m…

- Tama Janowitz