My mom used to tell me stories at night read books to me - and I read 'em over and over and over again. And you know what I learned from that? I went back and looked at everything - Why do I like reading the same stories over and over and over again? What was I some kind of nincompoop? No - the narrative gave me connection with my mom.
As a teacher at Princeton I'm surrounded by people who work hard so I just make good use of my time. And I don't really think of it as work - writing a novel in one sense is a problem-solving exercise.
