We Try To Keep The Beautiful Memories,

If A Woman Is Worth Remembering,' Said My Grandmother, 'there Is No Need To Have Her Name Carved In Letters.

There Is This Split Between The Haiti Of Before The Earthquake And The Haiti Of After The Earthquake. So When I'm Writing Anything Set In Haiti Now, Whether Fiction Or Nonfiction, Always In The Back Of My Mind Is How People, Including Some Of My Own Family Members, Have Been Affected Not Just By History And By The Present But Also By The Earthquake.

No One Will Love You More Than You Love Your Pain.

That Experience Of Touching Down In A Totally Foreign Place Is Like Having A Blank Canvas: You Begin With Nothing, But Stroke By Stroke You Build A Life. This Process Requires Everything Great Art Requires-risk-tasking, Hope, A Great Deal Of Imagination, All The Qualities That Are The Building Blocks Of Art. You Must Be Able To Dream Something Nearly Impossible And Toil To Bring It Into Existence.

I Was Neither Doing These People Nor Myself A Favor By Showing Up When My Heart Wasn't In It. There Were Not Getting The Real Me, The Whole Me, The True Me.