I grew up in a storytelling culture, a tribal culture, but also in an American storytelling culture.

And then I realized that my sister was trying to LIVE a romance novel. Man, that takes courage and imagination. Well, it also took some degree of mental illness, too, but I was suddenly happy...

If it’s fiction, then it better be true.

Imagination is the politics of dreams; imagination turns every word into a bottle rocket. . . . Imagine every day is Independence Day and save us from traveling the river changed; save us from hitchhiking...

But the real interesting stuff is in the cellar and the attic.

Well,” she said, “how can I be sure there aren’t invisible people in the world? Scientists didn’t believe in the mountain gorilla for hundreds of years. And now look. So if scientists can be wrong,...

Can you hear the dreams crackling like a campfire? Can you hear the dreams sweeping through the pine trees and tipis? Can you hear the dreams laughing in the sawdust? Can you hear the dreams...

He sang ‘Stairway to Heaven’ in four different languages but never knew where that staircase stood.

When you read a piece of writing that you admire, send a note of thanks to the author.

son,” Mr. P said. “You’re going to find more and more hope the farther and farther you walk away from this sad, sad, sad reservation.

I used to think the world was broken down by tribes,’ I said. ‘By Black and White. By Indian and White. But I know this isn’t true. The world is only broken into two tribes:...

Sometimes, she wondered what she was missing, if her life was somehow incomplete because she didn’t see the reflection of her face in the face of a son or daughter. Maybe. That’s what mothers told...

Certainly I’m angry at the way Indians have been treated and continue to be treated. But I don’t think it’s a helpless emotion.

I wanted to do a weird book and reestablish my independent, small-press roots.

I learned how to stop crying.I learned how to hide inside of myself.I learned how to be somebody else.I learned how to be cold and numb.

Poetry = Anger x Imagination

They put me in a holding cell with a black kid and a white kid and a Chinese kid. We’re the United Nations of juvenile delinquents.

My name is Sherman J. Alexie Jr., and I am an insomniac.

Despite all of the time he spent in Big Heart’s, Wilson had never come to understand the social lives of Indians. He did not know that, in the Indian world, there is not much social...

I would close my eyes and dream of something strong, dream of horses exploding, rising into the air, their hearts beating survive, survive, survive.

He wanted the songs, the stories, to save everybody.

If I wasn’t writing poems I’d be washing my hands all the time.

Then I remember that God is really, really old. So maybe God has God arthritis. And maybe that’s why the world sucks. Maybe God’s hands and fingers don’t work as well as they used to.

Read. Read 1000 pages for every 1 page that you write.

For the mentally disturbed, Marie knew these sandwich visits might be the only dependable moments in their lives. She also knew she delivered the sandwiches for her own sanity. Something would crumble inside of her...

What inspires a poem for me is usually a moment.

In a real-world way, my gifts are very limited in terms of what I can do.

I’d only seen Julius play a few times, but he had that gift, that grace, those fingers like a goddamn medicine man. One time, when the tribal school traveled to Spokane to play this white...

Everyone I have lost in the closing of a doorthe click of the lockis not forgotten, theydo not die but remainwithin the soft edgesof the earth, the ashof house fires and cancerin sin and forgivenesshuddled...

THE UNOFFICIAL AND UNWRITTEN(but you better follow them or you’re going to get beaten twice as hard)SPOKANE INDIAN RULES OF FISTICUFFS:1. IF SOMEBODY INSULTS YOU, THEN YOU HAVE TO FIGHT HIM.2. IF YOU THINK SOMEBODY...

My wife was the first romantic partner who understood both American and native parts of me – not so much the positive stuff, but the damage.

A bullet only costs about two cents, and anybody can afford that.

I remember when I had this dream that told me to go to Spokane, to stand by the falls in the middle of the city and wait for a sign. I knew I had to...

Thomas Builds-the-Fire’s stories climbed into your clothes like sad, gave you itches that could not be scratched. If you repeated eve a sentence from one of those stories, your throat was never the same again....

I look more Indian when I’m serious.

Teenagers read millions of books every year. They read for entertainment and for education. They read because of school assignments and pop culture fads. And there are millions of teens who read because they are...

The ordinary can be like medicine.

I’m a freak with power.

You know, people speak in poetry all the time. They just don’t realize it.

My career means, if you’re a non-Indian writing about Indians, at least there’s one Indian in your rearview mirror.

Last night I missed two free throws which would have won the game against the best team in the state. The farm town high school I play for is nicknamed the “Indians,” and I’m probably...

Do you understand how amazing it is to hear that from an adult? Do you know how amazing it is to hear that from anybody? It’s one of the simplest sentences in the world, just...

Like a good Indian, he knew when to talk and when to remain silent. Like a good Indian, he knew there was never a good time to talk.

I thought I’d been condescended to as an Indian – that was nothing compared to the condescension for writing young adult literature.

They’re all gone, my tribe is gone. Those blankets they gave us, infected with smallpox, have killed us. I’m the last, the very last, and I’m sick, too. So very sick. Hot. My fever burning...

If one reads enough books one has a fighting chance. Or better, one’s chances of survival increase with each book one reads.

In the middle of the night, when you’re ambiguously ethnic, like me, when you’re brown, beige, mauve, siena, one of those lighter browns in the Crayola box. You have to be careful of the cops...

Well, I think the worst part about tribalism is its tendency to fundamentalize, and if I can fight fundamentalism in any of its forms I’m happy.

You wouldn’t think there is anything life threatening about speech impediments, but let me tell you, there is nothing more dangerous than being a kid with a stutter and a lisp.

It’s not oil that runs the world, it’s shame.