In the summer of 1956, my mother was pregnant with me, which caused my father to confess his fear that I was going to be too much of a burden for him because he had a history of depression.

The essential gesture of the contemporary novel is to get people to turn the page, to entertain them, and I hate that. I want a novel where the gesture is towards existential investigation on every page. That, to me, is thrilling.

Swimming is by far the best tonic I've found for my back. I'm not a good swimmer - I do the breaststroke or elementary backstroke in the slow lane - but when I took a two-week break from swimming I was surprised how much I missed it.

David Shields Quotes