Next week David Sedaris returns for his third consecutive summer performing on Martha’s Vineyard. He admits he is a big fan of the Island, but also says he could never spend his summers here.

“It’s just too much of a good thing,” Mr. Sedaris said in a recent interview, which means it wouldn’t generate much material for him.

Mr. Sedaris prefers to look at life as an outsider, he said. “I feel like when I started off I was an outsider because I was gay, but that’s not enough anymore.”

Thus a liberal gay man having a beach house he calls the Sea Section located in the heart of the conservative South, near where he grew up, and, in part, his choice to live abroad, first in France and now in the English countryside.

“It keeps you puzzled,” he said. “I like being puzzled and scratching my head.”

And a big difference between America and England?

“Guns. In England people get stabbed. I find that so sweet, it feels almost intimate,” he said.

Mr. Sedaris spent his twenties and early thirties doing odd jobs to make ends meet while he worked on his writing. Then, at the age of 35, he broke through with The Santaland Diaries, his true-life story about playing an elf at a New York department store during the holiday season. The story was broadcast on This American Life and was followed by many more essays and bestselling books. His essays are always personal and are often about his family, his growing up in the South, his sisters, life abroad — anything, really, is fair game as long as it is funny.

But unlike most writers who squirrel themselves away in seclusion, living the life of anonymous scribblers, David Sedaris brackets his writing life with performing. His touring schedule is constant, giving readings all over the country and the world.

“Other writers may not want the distraction, but I love the attention,” he said. “For me, it’s when can I do it again?”

It also gives him ample opportunity to test out new material for essays. In fact, by the time an essay appears in a book he has tried out numerous versions in front of live audiences, a bravery nearly unheard of in the writing world.

And how does he know if something will make the cut?

“If they laugh, it’s good,” he said.

But he also listens to advice after a show. One of his trademarks is to stay afterwards signing books and talking with his fans until everyone has had a chance to interact with him and even given feedback.

“One woman told me she didn’t like a story and she gave me the reason why she didn’t like it and then I agreed with her.”

For the shy ones, Mr. Sedaris will even help prompt the conversation.

“I’ll ask them if they know anyone who is allergic to meat. That sort of thing.”

At his readings, he also shares excerpts from his diary, something he has been keeping since 1977. His next book will be a collection of these entries. Over the past several months he has being reading through his old diaries, in effect rediscovering who he was as a young man and who he is today.

“The best diary entries are when nothing really happened,” he said. “Like maybe I saw a centipede attack a worm.”

While reading his early work he said he kept shaking his head over his 20-year-old writing self, wishing he could tell him to just get on with it.

One thing that has changed over the years about his diary is what time of day he writes.

“For years I wrote at night while drinking,” he said. “I only had a certain amount of time before I passed out.”

As his drinking increased, his writing decreased until, he said: “I only had about 15 minutes before I couldn’t do it anymore.”

Eventually, drinking drifted from nights to days and mornings too.

“I was in New York and it was 11 a.m. and I was drunk and I thought, I’m really drunk and it’s 11 a.m. and all these people are not drunk. That was the beginning of the end.”

Mr. Sedaris has been sober for many years, and now he writes first thing in the morning. He doesn’t have a television at home but watches one at the gym, which is his incentive to go to the gym in the first place. His favorite show is Intervention, where people are trying to break the grip of addiction.

“I like the alcoholics the best,” he said. “But it always kills me when they relapse. I end up screaming at the TV, what are you waiting for?”

He said he is influenced by many writers, but that as a kid he spent a lot of time with a particular collection of biographies about famous people, mostly frontiersmen and war heroes. Each book, whether it was about Sam Houston or Abraham Lincoln, would end at the subject’s teenage years, long before the person had achieved the success we know them for today. It struck a chord with him, growing up in North Carolina and wondering who and what he might be some day.

“I’d be reading about Daniel Boone when he was a teenager and didn’t know that he would be famous some day. He was just a kid. And so I would think maybe that could happen to me. I’m just doing my chores right now but maybe someday I’ll be someone.”

In art school, he had a similar curiosity about whether he would ever be somebody.

“I’d look around and wonder who would end up being famous? I just wanted to know who it would be, because I was sure it wouldn’t be me. It never occurred to anyone that it would be me.”

And now that he is so well known?

“Let’s face it,” he said. “It’s midget celebrity. But it’s not bad for a writer.”

David Sedaris performs on Tuesday, July 26, at 8 p.m. at the Old Whaling Church in Edgartown, and on Wednesday, July 27, at Performing Arts Center at the regional high school. Both shows are part of the Martha’s Vineyard Concert Series. For tickets and information, visit mvconcertseries.com.