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Mavis Gallant

Mavis Gallant Quotes

Writer

Mavis Gallant, born on August 11, 1922 in Montreal, Canada, was an outstanding Canadian writer. Her works are renowned for their delicate psychological portrayal and unique narrative techniques, and she is widely considered one of the most important English-language writers of the 20th century.

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Famous Mavis Gallant Quotes

“I still do not know what impels anyone sound of mind to leave dry land and spend a lifetime describing people who do not exist. If it is child's play, an extension of make believe - something one is frequently assured by people who write about writing - how to account for the overriding wish to do that, just that, only that, and consider it as rational an occupation as riding a bicycle over the Alps?”

Source: Paris Stories

“Writing is like a love affair: the beginning is the best part.”

Writing Affair Love Affair

Author:Mavis Gallant

“I believed that if I was to call myself a writer, I should live on writing. If I could not live on it, even simply, I should destroy every scrap, every trace, every notebook and live some other way.”

Ifs Way Should Writing If I Could Notebook Scrap

Book:The Collected Stories

Source: The Collected Stories

“I write every day as a matter of course It is not a burden. It is the way I live.”

Way Writing Matter Courses Burden

Author:Mavis Gallant

“I wanted to live in Paris and write nothing but fiction and be perfectly free. I had decided all this had to be settled by the time I was thirty, and so I gave up my job and moved to Paris at twenty-eight. I just held my breath and jumped. I didn’t even look to see if there was water in the pool.”

Ifs Writing Looks Wanted Jobs Water Fiction Decided Twenties Breaths Moved Eight Paris Thirty Pool Gave Up

Author:Mavis Gallant

“A writer's life stands in relation to his work as a house does to a garden, related but distinct.”

Writing Doe House Garden Relation Related

Author:Mavis Gallant

“I began to ration my writing, for fear I would dream through life as my father had done. I was afraid I had inherited a poisoned gene from him, a vocation without a gift.”

Writing Done Dream Father Genes Vocation Rations

Book:Varieties of Exile

Source: Varieties of Exile

About the Author

Born: August 11, 1922
Died: February 18, 2014
Known for: Writer
Quotes: 25

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Books & Sources

My Heart Is BrokenRelated source material

The Collected StoriesRelated source material

Varieties of ExileRelated source material

A Fairly Good Time: with Green Water, Green SkyRelated source material

Paris StoriesRelated source material

The Cost of Living: Early and Uncollected StoriesRelated source material

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