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Richard Ford Quotes

Novelist

Richard Ford, born on February 16, 1944, is a renowned American novelist. His works are known for their delicate emotional descriptions and profound thematic explorations, with notable titles such as 'Independence Day' and 'The Lay of the Land'.

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Famous Richard Ford Quotes

“People surprise you, Frank, with just how fuckin stupid they are.”

People Stupidity

Book:The Sportswriter

Source: The Sportswriter

“I'm trying to cause people to be interested in the particulars of their lives because I think that's one thing literature can do for us. It can say to us: pay attention. Pay closer attention. Pay stricter attention to what you say to your son.”

People Thinking Trying Literature Causes Can Do Pay Attention One Thing Son Pay Attention Your Son

Author:Richard Ford

“I'm not one of those people who as a writer lets my characters tell me what they want to do or call to me or seek me. I go seeking for things, using them as an agent, really.”

People Want Character Seeking Agents

Author:Richard Ford

“I'm dyslexic. If you can reconcile yourself to not being able to burn through books, which you shouldn't any way, you can slow the whole process down. Then, because of my disability, there is more for me in imaginative literature than there is for other people.”

People Ifs Way Book Whole Able Literature Process Disability Imaginative Reconcile Dyslexic

Author:Richard Ford

“I think that's the thing that memoir can do more than anything it does; it testifies and bears witness to the existence of people whose lives, pleasures and virtues would never have been testified to without my having done it. That makes me really glad.”

People Thinking Done Pleasure Existence Virtue Glad Memoir Witness

Author:Richard Ford

“There are more people in America that love guns and want guns for themselves and everyone else than there are not. It is also true that liberals who don't want guns are puny by and large. They're not risking anything, all they're doing is saying they don't like something. Liberals are quick to say this should happen and this should not happen, but they don't do anything about it much.”

People Gun

Author:Richard Ford

“Some people think that writers are innately solitary and that there's a kind of romance to that solitariness. I tend to think that what writers really want to do is get accepted into things. They want to get accepted into society, into culture, into intelligentsia, into the fun. Writing is their mechanism, their instrument, for doing that.”

People Thinking Writing Kind Romance Culture Fun Accepted Solitary

Author:Richard Ford

“Until you can become accountable to yourself and only yourself, you're probably not going to live a fully vital life. So much of literature is about accountability. The moral issues in most novels are about people becoming responsible for their own behaviour. One of the forces against being responsible for your own behaviour is the force of the past, in the way that the past tries to form you.”

People Trying Past Literature Moral Novel Responsible Accountability Being Responsible

Author:Richard Ford

“Humans generally get out the gist of what they need to say right at the beginning, then spend forever qualifying, contradicting, burnishing or taking important things back. Yor rareley miss anything by cutting most people off after two sentences.”

People Needs Humans Two Important Forever Cutting Missing Important Things Sentences Contradicting Qualifying Gist

Author:Richard Ford

“Things happen when people are not where they belong, and the world moves forward and back by that principle.”

People World Happens Moving Principles Things Happen Moving Forward

Book:Canada

Source: Canada

“Some people want to be bank presidents. Other people want to rob banks.”

People Want President

Book:Canada

Source: Canada

“Something will be there when the flood recedes. We know that. It will be those people now standing in the water, and on those rooftops - many black, many poor. Homeless. Overlooked. And it will be New Orleans - though its memory may be shortened, its self-gaze and eccentricity scoured out so that what's left is a city more like other cities, less insular, less self-regarding, but possibly more self-knowing after today. A city on firmer ground.”

People Knows May Self Today Left Black Water Memories Poor Cities Knowing Standing Flood Homeless New Orleans Overlooked Eccentricity Rooftops Self Knowing

Author:Richard Ford

“America beats on you so hard the whole time. You are constantly being pummeled by other people's rights and their sense of patriotism.”

People Hard Whole America Rights Beats

Author:Richard Ford

“My job is to have empathy and curiosity for things that I've never done. Also, I'm a person whom people talk to.”

People Persons Done Jobs Empathy Curiosity

Author:Richard Ford

“When people realize they are being listened to, they tell you things.”

People Realizing Listening

Author:Richard Ford

About the Author

Born: February 16, 1944
Known for: Novelist
Quotes: 128

Books & Sources

CanadaRelated source material

The SportswriterRelated source material

The Bascombe Novels: The Sportswriter, Independence Day, The Lay of the LandRelated source material

The Lay of the LandRelated source material

A Multitude of SinsRelated source material

Independence DayRelated source material

A Piece of My HeartRelated source material

Let Me Be Frank With YouRelated source material

Rock SpringsRelated source material

The Sportswriter: Bascombe Trilogy (1)Related source material

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