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I don't know Arabic. I can't speak or write it.

Many Arabic/Islamic words have now entered the English dictionary, such as haj, hijab, Eid, etc., and I no longer need to put them in italics or explain them.

Arabic is very twisting, very beautiful. The call to prayer is quite haunting; it almost makes you a believer on the spot.

I feel a great kinship with my origins, even though I only learned a few words of Arabic.

But my Arabic is pretty good. It's good enough to have conversations with people, to understand what they say, to understand what they're feeling.

Being published in Arabic is a strong and consistent wish I have. I live in the Middle East and want to be in some sort of an unpragmatic dialogue with my neighbors.

Everybody needs to understand that I learned Arabic from the United States Army as a second language. I never spoke it at home.

I do not use the language of my people. I can take liberties with certain themes which the Arabic language would not allow me to take.

As teenagers, a lot of us just did not want much to do with Arabic culture - we looked to the West.

The fact of simultaneously being Christian and having as my mother tongue Arabic, the holy language of Islam, is one of the basic paradoxes that have shaped my identity.