I think literature is best when it’s voicing what we would prefer not to talk about.
You could pay Arthur Janov to teach you to scream about history, or you could learn prayer or a mantra, or you could write your life down and hope to make peace with it, write it down, or paint it, or turn it into improvisational theater, but that was the best you could probably do. You were stuck.
The past was so past it hurt.
Genre is a bookstore problem, not a literary problem.
I published a bunch of my older books in e-book format with Open Road, which is great and has tons of hard to find older books available there.
I judged about a zillion awards this year so Ive been reading a lot of books that just came out.
The process of composition, messing around with paragraphs and trying to make really good prose, is hardwired into my personality.
I had a talk with the president of my publisher, and he averred that e-books are dropping off. So I wonder if the potential advantages are really going to happen as quickly as they ought.
I turned forty, and Im finally going to get married and maybe have a kid.
There is no right or wrong reading of Naked Lunch, though some readings are more common, and thus Burroughs commercial is not the issue.
I believe in choosing the hardest book imaginable. I believe in reading up on what others have to say about this difficult book, and then making up my own mind.
It’s also true, however, that having conquered the regional writer ghetto, I am now intent on conquering the nationalist writer ghetto and moving out into the world more.
I have worked really hard to defy categorization, to break down a taxonomy whenever it comes my way.
I always wanted to write something illustrated, and the Details strip finally gave me the opportunity.