The novel doesn't come into existence until certain methods of reproducing fiction come along.

What I really dream of is that somebody would blow everything I've done out of the water in a beautiful way, which would clear the way for something better to come along.

The novel is the first art form that is an honest-to-god commodity. That's what makes it different from both high art and folk art.

Cooper wrote a novel which is absolutely indistinguishable from Austen, completely from a female point of view, completely English, no sense that he was an American.

Henry Miller wrote novels, but he calls his protagonist Henry, often Henry Miller, and his books are in this gray area between memoir and novel.

I never met anybody in my life who says, I want to be a critic. People want to be a fireman, poet, novelist.