Telling the Truth Is a Ruthless Act

I think telling the truth is kind of a ruthless act and – both in specifics since you do invade some privacies in fiction. And in the larger way, you are trying to – or I am trying to, as it were, rub humanity's face in the facts of our existence that there is much that is ignoble and desperate about being a human being. And my fiction is in part motivated by pointing these things out. So, yes, there is something ruthless and cruel, even to generate suspense as a bit of a tease, isn't it? So there's a kind of a sadistic element in the writer's attempt to keep the reader's interest.

JOHN UPDIKE