Quotessence
Home / Authors / Maggie O'Farrell
Maggie O'Farrell

Maggie O'Farrell Quotes

Author

Filter quotes by topic

AllWritingPeopleThinkingBookNovelReadingTryingHappensIrelandProblemChildrenDadDueloDyslexiaGriefHelpingHouseIfsKidsKnows

Famous Maggie O'Farrell Quotes

“Spending a lot of time away from home was strange. My parents visited me, obviously, but I was in hospital a lot, alone. And then when my health had improved a bit and I was in a sick-bed in the house, with the life of the house going on around me, that was very vivid for me. I always think that's a bit like the position of a novelist in a novel, going through drafts: there but not there, one remove from reality.”

ThinkingHomeRealityHouseParentNovelStrangeTime Away
Author:Maggie O'Farrell
Create image

“The role you've been ascribed in childhood can twist or break apart or seem outgrown, especially when you have your own family and begin to see your own childhood from a different angle. You remember. You reassess. I think that was the kernel of the novel for me. This idea that you change but that your family, the people you were born into, might find that change hard to accept. You no longer fit the mold you've always been ascribed. When the adult children in the book converge back on their small family home there's a sense that they don't fit there anymore.”

PeopleThinkingChildrenBookDifferentHomeRememberAcceptingBreakNovelChildhoodFitOur Family
Author:Maggie O'Farrell
Create image

“I think all families have these secrets, and it's sometimes the strangest things that bring them out. That was part of my interest in the heatwave, in heat as a catalyst for uncovering truths. I was reading Alice in Wonderland to one of my kids recently, and I remembered that it starts on a really hot day. Alice falls asleep because of the heat; the whole story is predicated on falling into a heat-fueled dream.”

ThinkingSometimesDreamKidsFallReadingInterestSecretHot
Author:Maggie O'Farrell
Create image

“While I was writing the book, one of my children was diagnosed with dyslexia. Dyslexia is a very tiny word for a wide-ranging neurological condition that affects different people in different ways. But I was reading an awful lot about it, to try and find ways of helping my child. I think a lot of fiction comes from this desire to confront unanswerable questions, and it's heartbreaking to see your child, a bright child, struggling so much with something that others are finding so easy. It's such an assault to the child's self-esteem and, as a mother, it's hard to watch.”

PeopleThinkingWritingTryingChildrenBookDifferentHelpingMotherDesireReadingEasyStruggleOur ChildrenMy ChildrenYour ChildrenHeartbreakingDyslexia
Author:Maggie O'Farrell
Create image

“I still have a stammer. I hate it; I loathe and despise it. But it's always there, and I have lots of ways to conceal it. I can conceal it now but I'm not good on the telephone. I get my husband to make dentist appointments. And I hate live radio. Hate it. I really try to avoid it at all costs. But it's always there. Stammerers become skilled at sentence construction and synonyms: we have to be. Faced with a problem word, we need to have instant access to eight others we could use instead - ones we could say without stumbling. I think my stammer is a huge part of my being a writer.”

ThinkingTryingProblemHateHusbandI HateInstantMy HusbandConstructionDentistSynonym
Author:Maggie O'Farrell
Create image