In 1959 the University recognized our work by appointing me to a new Chair of Radio Astronomy.

Spider-Man initially made me want to come to New York and work for Marvel; I wanted to be a comic book artist.

I didn't go out for a soap until I moved to New York. I wasn't even considering soaps, but my agents talked me into it and said it's nice, steady work.

I came to New York to study theater and stayed and was doing exactly what I wanted to do. It's because of that work that some doors eventually opened for me.

New Year's resolutions generally don't work for me. Or I don't work for them. I make them, like everyone else, but I can't think of one I have stuck to for more than 24 hours.

The terror of figuring out a new genre, of telling a new story, is what makes the job exciting, keeps me from getting bored, and I assume it keeps whoever follows my work from getting bored as well.

I've recently rediscovered Anthony Trollope. I used to read him back in college, and a friend turned me on to a whole new series of his work, 'The Palliser Series.' It's a series of seven or eight books.

Not only may she unconsciously register a favorable impression with my associates and me, but she may also suggest something by her work that will lead to some new and novel feature in a forthcoming production.

By 1949, there was no more work for me out there, and I went to New York in 1950 and just did whatever I could. Mainly television. Some Broadway. A lot of dinner theater work, which is not a very satisfactory medium.

I moved to New York when I was 21 and worked between 40 and 70 hours a week. Then I invested it all. It was really just a hustle. But I was kind of raised to work like that, so to me, it seemed very normal and natural.

I didn't finish college; my parents didn't graduate college - we didn't have a pot to piss in. I'm from Newark, New Jersey. I had to work. I didn't think it would be possible for me to be an artist without having a job.

I'm far from being a consummate artist. I mean, this is just my first album, and the work is very new. I'm just beginning, and I'm certainly not worthy of demigod status. There's absolutely no danger of me reaching that.

'Bloodshot,' for me, was unlike anything I'd ever done before, which was really the draw of it. In addition to trying to reconnect with my earlier work, I also wanted to try to do something that was completely new and different.

Race and class are rendered distinct analytically only to produce the realization that the analysis of the one cannot proceed without the other. A different dynamic it seems to me is at work in the critique of new sexuality studies.

The common, the quotidian, is so much more unyielding to me, really stubborn and hard to work with, and I like this because it makes me think and it makes me worry. I can't just plunge my hand into the meat of it. I need new approaches.

As a stand-up, as a storyteller, as an improviser, I've done thousands of shows. They allow me to work out new material that might turn into something later. They let me keep my muscles sharp for when the rent-paying gigs do come along. They keep me sane.

Some months ago, while I was preparing a new work, I told a young cinema executive my intention of including in a soundtrack two themes from Bach. But when he asked me which has been the last hit from that Bach?, then I knew that I had no longer place in cinema.

I've done commercial work for Amtrak. However, that was branded as Stanton. I stipulated at the very beginning that it was not going to involve 'Humans of New York,' that I wasn't going to promote it on 'Humans of New York.' So nobody who follows me really even knows that I did it.

Being shortlisted for the Swansea University International Dylan Thomas Prize is, of course, a real honour for me and my work. When I wrote 'Conversations with Friends,' it was hard for me to imagine the book even finding readers - so it's a huge privilege to find it judged alongside such exciting and innovative new writing. I'm very grateful.

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