Writing is no dying art form in America because most published writers here accept the wisdom and the necessity of encouraging the talent that follows in their footsteps.

What's different now is that while political leaders used to give talking points to talk radio now talk-radio hosts are giving talking points to political leaders. It's all part of the suffocating spin cycle we're in. In media politics and publishing the conventional wisdom is to play to this base.

You know it's sort of common wisdom among New York publishers that short story collections don't make money.

I put forward formless and unresolved notions as do those who publish doubtful questions to debate in the schools not to establish the truth but to seek it.

In matters of truth the fact that you don't want to publish something is nine times out of ten a proof that you ought to publish it.

Since fantasy isn't about technology the accelleration has no impact at all. But it's changed the lives of fantasy writers and editors. I get to live in England and work for a New York publisher!

Technology has changed the way book publishing works as it has changed everything else in the world of media.

Here you have a new technology and if that technology is going to work you must allow people to provide central indexes of the data. It's just like a newspaper that publishes classified ads.

After this I took private lessons in Italian from an elementary school teacher. He gave me themes to write about and some of them turned out so well that he told me to publish them in a newspaper.

He was the editor of our paper. He created the publishing house in Hebrew. He was - I wouldn't say the 'guru' - but really he was our teacher and a most respected man. I wrote for the paper of the youth movement.