Writing and creating, those things come to me on their own. I feel like... you sort of summon them and it's like allowing the universe to enter your heart in an entirely different way to what it normally does. It's like inviting that energy of the universe to enter into your craft in a way where it has a meaning.

I can sing the saddest song with a bunch of people, and the feeling of sharing that energy activates in a way that either heals it or makes me feel like I've risen a thousand miles above it into space, and I'm staring down on it as a little dot.

I see this beautiful and tragic world, and I do my best to describe it, because it's been crushing to me since I was a kid. It seems to be how I connect.

For me, the best thing you can do as a man in loving someone is to do your best, go on that walk, and at the end of that walk be as much of a gentleman as you were in the beginning.

Rather than have joy, I would rather be absent of pain.

If art is to nourish the roots of our culture, society must set the artist free to follow his vision wherever it takes him.

I used to feel that I spent too much of my time in my pajamas doing nothing, and I'd think 'in the time that I don't spend writing, I could raise a family of five.' In a lot of ways, being a writer is lonely and alienating.

Here's something weird, though: I loved Jimi's music so much that I would never perform it for people. Throughout my teens and playing in various bands, I refused to play Hendrix songs. I know that sounds strange, but Jimi's music was so special to me that it was like works of art that shouldn't be touched or altered.