An Interview With Ted Chiang

"You mean, where do I get my ideas? I don’t know; I just write about what I’m interested in. Annie Dillard once wrote, 'Why do you never find anything written about that idiosyncratic thought you advert to, about your fascination with something no one else understands? Because it is up to you. There is something you find interesting, for a reason hard to explain. It is hard to explain because you have never read it on any page; there you begin. You were made and set here to give voice to this, your own astonishment.' ”