I think that the content of that work at the moment of arrival at the page is exactly the strategy that allows you to get there. Because getting there is the trick, getting there is the trouble. But once you get there, once your life is organised so beautifully so that there is a table, a chair, a typwewriter, that is an incredible triumph.

Most people give up [...] My mind is not particularly fertile. My only success is the fact that I've been able to get to the desk. My whole life has been trying to arrange those moments when I take care of everything that is not in the room, and have the moment to arrive. And usually what I am writing about is everything I've had to do to get to the moment of writing at the desk.

Leonard Cohen, speaking to Michael Silverblatt