I don't write a quick draft and then revise; instead, I work slowly page by page, revising and polishing.

I draft quickly and then revise, a lot.

I can't go on to page two until I can get page one as perfect as I can make it, ... That might mean I will rewrite and rewrite page one 20, 30, 50, 100 times. I build a book the way coral reefs are formed, on all these little dead bodies of marine polyps, you know?

I revise obsessively. It's important to me to have a clean page.

If I drive myself to the brink of my ability, then I don't get stale or bored.

Some days I'm lucky to squeeze out a page of copy that pleases me, but I get as many as six or seven pages on a very good day; the average is probably three pages.