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You Know What Needs To Be Done When You're A Writer. You Know What The Job Is, Particularly If You're An African American Writer, Or If You Deal With People, Or If Your Subjects Are Poor People Or People Who Need Voice. So You Don't Really Need To Know Whether Or Not You Are Doing The Right Thing. What You Have To Be Wary Of If You're Doing The Right Thing To The Right Level That Will Surpass Your Own Life. I'm Hoping That My Work Will Surpass My Own Life.

There Are Some Really Great Books That Have Been Written About Slavery, But I Don't Think That The Discourse About It In Society Has Been Very Accurate Or Healthy. I Don't Think We've Come Up With Ways To Tell It That Don't Insult People Or Hit Them In The Wrong Way. Part Of The Problem Is That Most People Don't Really Understand What Slavery Was Anyway. Most White People Didn't Own Slaves. Slavery Was A Way Of Life, Just Like Driving Cars Is A Way Of Life Now. It Doesn't Mean That It Was Right.

Music And Writing Do Fold Together In The Sense That You Have To Have A Certain Level Of Skill In Order To Execute Your Ideas And You Need A Medium. The Idea Of Improvisation Is One That Many Writers Fall Into, And I Improvise A Great Deal When I'm Writing, But There's A Structural Framework That I'm Working Around, And That Takes More Time Than The Actual Writing. Once The Characters Get To Yapping And Talking, They'll Move From One Room To The Next, And I Just Have To Make Sure That The House Is Built. That's Really Hard, That's The Kind Of Thing That Sits With You All Day Long.

First Person Narrative Is A Very Effective Tool But You Have To Know As A Writer How To Make It Work.

It Was Always So Hot, And Everyone Was So Polite, And Everything Was All Surface But Underneath It Was Like A Bomb Waiting To Go Off. I Always Felt That Way About The South, That Beneath The Smiles And Southern Hospitality And Politeness Were A Lot Of Guns And Liquor And Secrets.