Tablet Magazine

I have to admit that all this obsession with identity is one I don’t fully understand. Identity to me is my passport, which has my name and my photograph. I never considered my characters as being in any way confused about their identity. It is true, however, that they’re struggling, and that they suffer from loss or some other hardship and are trying to piece their lives back together, but these are universal struggles, neither Jewish nor non-Jewish. My ambition as a writer has always been to write about the meaningful things in a person’s life—being born, growing up, falling in love, being in love—and the experiences they create.