Chang-Rae Lee

I don't like to use writing assignments, exercises. I think too often people get comfortable writing in that vein, but you can't go on to write a novel comprised of short writing exercises.

I suppose people might consider me a 'loose' reader, as I seem willing to read anything of quality thinking and prose.

It's hard to write a war story without thinking about the 'Iliad.' Because the 'Iliad' knows everything about war.

I'm interested in people who find themselves in places, either of their choosing or not, and who are forced to decide how best to live there. That feeling of both citizenship and exile, of always being an expatriate - with all the attendant problems and complications and delight.

We read and remember certain writers because they offer distinctive voices and perspectives, because they've given themselves over completely and passionately to their obsessions while vigorously ignoring everything else.

I'll read pretty much anywhere and anytime, but for a while now, I've really enjoyed reading on flights, especially the longer hauls, when I'm unplugged from everything and can completely immerse myself in the world of a book and submit happily to its rhythms, perspectives, ideas.

We grow up with this idea that we're all individual agents. We work, make our money, have our place to live and our satellite TV. But whether you like it or not, you need family or community.

A novel, even a social realist one, can't simply be a comprehensive rendering of what is. A novel requires a special angle or approach, whether in structure or language or theme, to justify itself.

My writing day follows my family's day. I get a good few hours in the mornings when the kids are out of the house. And I don't work at night any more. I like to see my family.

My family immigrated when I was 3, and our predecessors inhabited the Korean Peninsula for as long as can be recalled.

We arrived the way most emigrant families did. My father came first, and the rest of us - my mother, my sister and me - followed a year later.

I didn't leave Wall Street because the work was against my nature - I do have a pretty good head for numbers. I left because I had this love for writing.