"In college, I took a poetry class with Jorie Graham, an amazing poet. She directed me to Hass, and his stuff moved me so much. His writing is very American, spare, clean. And manly. There’s a ruggedness to his poems. One in particular I’ve always loved is called ‘Dragonflies Mating.’ It combines a sense of abandonment in childhood with natural images. I don’t even know exactly what it means, but I think that’s what poetry does—it evokes all these feelings without our really understanding why or how it’s done."

"My uncle was a paranoid schizophrenic for his whole life, and I always strived to understand him through works of art. When I first saw Bergman’s depiction of schizophrenia and how it affects family members, I knew I was not alone in my quest to understand the human brain. Then when Lodge Kerrigan came along with Clean, Shaven, it was the first film that I believe truly depicted the honest horror of what it feels like to be imprisoned in a brain that is not yours to control."

"The way I look at it is that I’ve been searching for the perfect album to drink beer to my whole life. As far as that goes, this is it. This is the album. Perfect music to get drunk to: Iggy Pop and The Stooges. It’s just that raw energy. All the pieces are there, but it’s not squeaky clean. Like his album Raw Power, that’s exactly what his music is. Take your shirt off and chug a beer. That’s all there is to life at that point when you listen to that record."