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For me, writing essays is very much about processing ideas and offering them up to the reader so that they are fully cooked.

Novels are my favorite to write and read. I do like writing personal essays, too. I'm not really a short story writer, nor do I tend to gravitate to them as a reader.

For me, writing essays, prose and fiction is a great way to be self-indulgent.

Since childhood, I wrote a lot of fiction, a lot of stories, but I most loved writing essays.

The essays are different because ultimately it's things I'm interested in, and I'm really just writing about myself and using those subjects as a prism.

Writing is a lot of fun for me; that's not to say it's easy, but I really do enjoy it.

I have fun writing. I don't make it a chore. I don't have to struggle with it.

Writing can be fun. I think the challenge is to convey interesting things in accessible ways, and that's what I aim to do in books.

I love essays, but they're not always the best way to communicate to a larger audience.

There is more to be pondered in the grain and texture of life than traditional fiction allows. The work of essayists is vital precisely because it permits and encourages self-knowledge in a way that is less indirect than fiction, more open and speculative.