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Quote by Molly Antopol

“For so many of my characters, they were political in their own countries and they risked their lives for certain political beliefs that they had, only to be brought to America where they're not treated like Americans - they're just not really treated like anything.”

Quote by Molly Antopol

Author

Molly Antopol is an American fiction writer born in 1979. Her works are known for their delicate emotions and profound insights into themes such as identity, culture, and social change. more

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“It was this feeling for a lot of my characters, who are dissidents or banned artists and writers, that they had had to fight living under so much surveillance, and then suddenly they come to America and they're like, I'm not being surveilled - I'm not even being noticed at all.”

Character Feelings America Artist Fighting Surveillance Banned Dissidents Artists And Writers

Author:Molly Antopol

“With the Israel stories, it was for me the most surprising way the title would fit in. I kept thinking about, for a lot of my Israeli characters, what it was like to inherit such a complicated and symbiotic relationship to America and to feel how tangled that is, and it's nothing that they chose to do themselves.”

Thinking Way Feels Character Stories America Fit Israel Complicated Titles Surprising Israeli Tangled

Author:Molly Antopol

“I knew that I was writing for an American audience and that if I sold foreign rights, they would retranslate the book to make it make sense to that language. But one thing that was really important to me was not to italicize any of the words in the languages that were in the stories, because I feel like those foreign words felt just as important and integral to the story as everything else, so I wanted it all to just exist as its own thing.”

Ifs Feels Writing Important Book Stories Wanted Language Felt Audience Rights One Thing Make Sense

Author:Molly Antopol

“So it was doing all this research or going to the archives or doing all these interviews or traveling, and then trying as much as I can to delete all of that research in a later draft so that all the reader cares about is the characters.”

Trying I Can Character Care Reader Research Interviews Archives

Author:Molly Antopol

“It's funny - for a long time, I didn't know I was writing a book. I was writing stories. For me, each story took so long and took so much out of me, that when I finished it, I was like, Oh my gosh, I feel like I've poured everything from myself into this, and then I'd get depressed for a week. And then once I was ready to write a new story, I would want to write about something that was completely different, so I would search for a totally different character with a different set of circumstances.”

Knows Want Feels Writing Long Book Different Character Stories Week Ready Circumstances Long Time Finished Writing A Book Different Characters Writing Stories Oh My Gosh

Author:Molly Antopol

“But what I realized when I was looking back at them was that no matter how different they are, they're still coming from me, and they're still coming from my brain and my set of obsessions. I think that no matter how different I tried to make them, there were just these certain questions that I just kept circling back to as I was writing. I think they were the ones I was really swept up in in that decade.”

Thinking Writing Stills Different Matter Certain Brain Decades I Realized Obsession Looking Back

Author:Molly Antopol

“With the Holocaust - I wonder if a lot of Jewish writers of my generation have felt this way - it feels really intimidating to approach it. I feel like so many writers who have either lived through it firsthand or were part of that generation where they were closer to the people who were in it have written so beautifully about it, so there's no lack of great books about it”

People Ifs Way Feels Book Felt Wonder Written Generations Approach Holocaust Intimidating My Generation Great Book

Author:Molly Antopol

“It really made me nervous to write about it [Holocaust] and to approach it, because I was nervous about how to do it respectfully, and I was also thinking about how I could add something new to something that had already been so explored.”

Thinking Writing Made Approach Add Nervous Something New Holocaust

Author:Molly Antopol

“The Israel stories were really hard for me to write, because I think that my book is very much about politics, but it isn't political. It really was important for me to not have a political agenda at all, because I have a hard time stomaching any political fiction that feels message-y.”

Thinking Feels Writing Important Book Hard Stories Political Fiction Messages Israel Hard Times Agendas Political Agendas

Author:Molly Antopol

“It was tricky [to write about Israelis], because everyone has an opinion about the Arab - Israeli conflict, and when I first started writing these stories, I was working for an Arab - Israeli human rights group. It was during the Second Intifada. It was this totally violent and intense time, and I think there's a part of me where I don't know how to write about that situation without getting my politics out of my messages, and that's something that was important for me not to do in this book.”

Thinking Knows Writing Firsts Humans Important Book Stories Situation Opinion Know How Rights Groups Conflict Messages Human Rights Violent Intense Israeli Tricky Arab Israeli Conflict

Author:Molly Antopol