Finding Paul Bowles

"I met (American author) Paul Bowles in Tangiers and got to talk to him for about three hours. I was teaching over in Italy and I had his address from a friend, so I went to Morocco for a week to try to find him. Found his apartment, went up to his door, knocked on his door, asked if I could talk to him, and he said, 'Sure.' It was amazing. I've admired his writing for a long time, and he was a composer, also, originally, so talking to him a little bit about music was really amazing. And also writing. He turned me on to (author) Cormac McCarthy."
"What else did you learn from him?"
"I don't think I learned anything, it was just the exposure to him as an American from an older generation, like the F. Scott Fitzgerald generation, living in a foreign culture, and really making it work for his art was super interesting. And just his attitude was unique--yeah; it was a really special thing."

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