We think in sentences, and the way we think is the way we see.

Life is so rich, if you can write down the real details of the way things were and are, you hardly need anything else.

I know most of my writing friends are obsessed with writing. It works in the same way as chocolate does. We’re always thinking we should be writing no matter what else we might be doing. It’s not fun. The life of an artist isn’t easy. You’re never free unless you are doing your art.

Writers end up writing about their obsessions. Things that haunt them; things they can’t forget; stories they carry in their bodies waiting to be released.

There should also be shades of gray and blue. There are dentist appointments, sadness over the death of a dog, Jewish holidays or American Indian celebrations, sore throats, a visit from your grandmother. Life is very big. There should be a flexibility in our daily routines so we have the space to feel how good it is to receive a public school educ

That’s the great value of art—making the ordinary extraordinary. We awaken ourselves to the life we are living.

When you read a lot in that form, it becomes imprinted inside you, so when you sit down to write, you write in that structure.

Don’t tell readers what to feel. Show them the situation, and that feeling will awaken in them.

If you are a writer when writing, you also are a writer when you are cooking, sleeping, walking. And if you are a mother, a painter, a horse, a giraffe, or a carpenter, you will bring that into your writing, too. It comes with you. You can’t divorce yourself from parts of yourself.