My Family Is My Career.

There Are Two Responses To Really Awful Things. One Is To Lament And Say, "oh My God, Oh Lord." And The Other Is To Laugh At It A Little Bit, Try Your Best To Deal With It And, If You Can, Forget About It As Soon As Possible.

Be Kind To The Living.

If You're A Creative Person, You'd Better Not Read What People Write About You, Because If It's Good It'll Blow Your Head Up And It'll Force You Not To Take The Subway And You'll Start Taking Cabs, And You'd Better Stay Around People, And If It's Bad, It Just Hurts Your Feelings So Much It Discourages You.

Newt Gingrich Wrote A Novel, And He's A Short Story. Bill Clinton Wrote A Biography, And He's A Novel.

I'm One Of The Few Black Writers, Or African American Writers, Who Managed To Work My Way Through The System So That It Has Allowed Me To Speak In A Kind Of Free Way. But Most African American Writers Don't Have That. They Don't Have That Opportunity, They Don't Have That.