writing Quotes

Most American writers don't get asked their opinion on current affairs, whereas in Europe and England, we still do. There are writers here who are the most sophisticated commentators, but they're not asked. Like Don DeLillo, who sort of forecast most of the modern world before it happened.

When I'm writing books, something weird happens; and the result is the books contain a large amount of what you could call 'supernaturalism.' As a writer, I find I need that to explain the world I'm writing about.

Sometimes writing a novel is not unlike having a baby. You'd have to ask a female novelist to compare the pain.

Nobody wants to read a 600 page book in which the author is fabulous throughout.

The field of the novel is very rich. If you're a composer, you're well aware of the history of composition, and you are trying to make your music part of that history. You're not ahistorical. In the same way, I think, if you write now, you are writing in the historical context of what the novel has been and what possibilities it has revealed.

When you write, you write out of your best self. Everything else drops away.

Sometimes legends make reality, and become more useful than the facts.

I write books I'd enjoy reading, I'm the reader standing behind my shoulder.

I'm a big-city boy. What I like is big cities. It's not just what I like. It's what I write about.

I think, in a written novel, the way in which you play with the readers' emotion or the way in which you engage the readers' emotions can be very indirect. You could come at it through irony or comedy, etcetera, and you could capture people's sympathies and feelings kind of by stealth if you like.