Louise Erdrich

I grew up in North Dakota around Dakota and Ojibwe people, and also small-town people in Wahpeton. Writers make few choices, really, about their material. We have to write about what comes naturally and what interests us - so I do.

Quentin Tarantino was fantastic. I mean, he can be almost unbearable as a person. At a party, you can't get a word in edgewise for, like, an hour. But as a director, he is so completely open and just... present.

Death is really a great blessing for humanity, without it there could be no real progress. People who lived for ever would not only hamper and discourage the young, but they would themselves lack sufficient stimulus to be creative.