You might not remember what you had for dinner last night, but you remember everything about one particular summer of your youth. It's like that.

No one's memory is infallible, of course - quite the opposite.

You write about experiences partly to understand what they mean, partly not to lose them to time. To oblivion. But there's always the danger of the opposite happening. Losing the memory of the experience itself to the memory of writing about it.

There's a lot of material from my life in my books, but they're not really autobiographical, in the sense that they're not about my life. So, in 'A Feather on the Breath of God' I write about my parents, I write about this Russian immigrant, I write about the world of dance, but it isn't an autobiography; so much is left out.

After graduation, I moved to Los Angeles to do more theater, not realizing there is very little theater in L.A. It was a lucky mistake, though, because after just 2 1/2 months of waiting tables, my TV and film career really took off.

Novels aren't pedagogical instruments, or instructions in law or physics or any other discipline. A novel has to be an emotional experience, a trip of the imagination, and because science has raised so many issues that concern and affect humans, it's a good starting place for me.

A good education gives you confidence to stick up your hand for anything - whether it is the job you want, or the bloke. And the more you stick up your hand, the better your chances are that you will get what you want.

The great liberty of the fictional writer is to let the imagination out of the traces and see it gallop off over the horizon.