He Comes To This Other World And

There Were So Many Pittsburgh Poets In My Hallway That If, At That Instant, A Meteorite Had Come Smashing Through My Roof, There Would Never Have Been Another Stanza Written About Rusting Fathers And Impotent Steelworkers And The Bessemer Convertor Of Love.

I Have A Good Memory For Words, And When I Come Upon A Word I Don't Know, I Remember It, Or Try To - It's Almost Like A Tic.

Most Science Fiction Seemed To Be Written For People Who Already Liked Science Fiction; I Wanted To Write Stories For Anyone, Anywhere, Living At Any Time In The History Of The World.

The Instructor, Ms. Pease, Also Taught In The Church's Religious School, And She Had A Sunday School Manner At Once Saccharine And Condemnatory.

For Me, The Goal Is Always To Write A Novel That I Myself Would Like To Read. People Frequently Ask Me What My Favorite Book Is, And In Effect, There's Always A Capital-f Favorite, Capital-b Book That I Would Like To Write Myself Someday. I Try To Go For That Ideal Of Writing The Best, Most Entertaining, Most Beautifully Written Book That I Possibly Can.