I wrote fiction during my entire childhood, from age 4 to 18, and started writing plays when I went to Yale and Oxford.

I write essays to clear my mind. I write fiction to open my heart.

I've written fiction for as long as I can remember; it's always been my preferred form of play.

When writing screenplays, it's a matter of remembering to leave off the page anything and everything that doesn't appear on the screen.

The big ideas always come in flashes. I don't really craft stories that much. I genuinely don't know where these people come from, and I've often wondered if writing is just a socially acceptable form of madness.

As a writer, one is obliged to release her words, to let them live in the world on their own.