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I've never set out consciously to write American music. I don't know what that would be unless the obvious Appalachian folk references.

I think, being from east Tennessee, you're kinda born with a little lonesome in your soul, in your blood. You know you've got that Appalachian soul.

I think ethnic and regional labels are insulting to writers and really put restrictions on them. People don't think your work is quite as universal.

I felt uncomfortable calling myself a writer until I started with 'The New Yorker,' and then I was like, 'Okay, now you can call yourself that.'

I can remember in my early days of writing going to sort of writers' functions and parties and things like that, and I used to get very irritated because when people heard that you came from the suburbs, they had this notion that it was very un-cool to come from there.

Where writers are from is one of the world' s most boring topics. Where we're born, gender or race, wealth or poverty - those are the things we spend time talking about. Stop trying to label me. I'm a writer. Worry about whether I'm any good!

Offhand, the only North American writers I can think of who have come from a background of rural poverty and gone on to write about it have been Negroes.

I suppose more than anything, it's the way of life in this part of the country that influences my writing. In Eastern North Carolina, with the exception of Wilmington, most people live in small towns.

Growing up, all I did was write about the fact that I'm from where I'm from. I was a big champion of where I was from and Wisconsin in general, and the Midwest.