In a 1994 interview with Paul Galloway of the "Chicago Tribune", Staples reflected: "Being black enriches my experience; it doesn't define me ... I'm writing about universal themes – family and leaving home and developing your own identity – which all Americans can enjoy and understand." As a writer, he works to correct the myth that the American "black experience" is defined only by poverty, violence, and crime. In the same interview, he stated: "I despise the expression ['black experience']. There is no such thing. Black people's lives in this country are too varied to be reduced to a single term."