I'm Trying To Cause People To Be

Reading Is Probably What Leads Most Writers To Writing.

Even Though I Get A Lot Done With My Solitude, And I Make The Best Use Of It Possible, I Always Think Solitude Is An Interlude In A Period Of Time, Which Is Populated By Others.

My Father Died In My Arms. That's Tumult. That's Everything Exploding.

Something Will Be There When The Flood Recedes. We Know That. It Will Be Those People Now Standing In The Water, And On Those Rooftops - Many Black, Many Poor. Homeless. Overlooked. And It Will Be New Orleans - Though Its Memory May Be Shortened, Its Self-gaze And Eccentricity Scoured Out So That What's Left Is A City More Like Other Cities, Less Insular, Less Self-regarding, But Possibly More Self-knowing After Today. A City On Firmer Ground.

I Grew Up In Mississippi Being Told It Was A Great Place, But Not Feeling That. When I Finally Began Reading Seriously, Literature Showed Me Something About Where I Was From Which Was Worthwhile.