“The best novels are those that are important without being like medicine; they have something to say, are expansive and intelligent but never forget to be entertaining and to have character and emotion at their centre.” ImportantCharacterForgetEmotionNovelIntelligentMedicineNever ForgetEntertainingCentre Author:Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
“Have the courage to analyze great emotions to create characters who shall be lofty and true. The whole art of the analytical novel lies there.” ArtWholeCharacterLyingEmotionNovelLofty Author:Paul Bourget
“The sympathies of a well-adjusted person can easily be aroused by the plight of strangers. Indeed, the skillful writer of a novel, a play, or an opera can engage our emotions on behalf of people who are not only strangers to us, but who do not even exist! And a person whose emotions cannot be so aroused is not behaving normally.” PeopleWellsPersonsPlayEmotionNovelStrangerOperaHuman ConditionBehalfSkillfulPlight Author:John Derbyshire
“Cinema is a kind of pan-art. It can use, incorporate, engulf virtually any other art: the novel, poetry, theater, painting, sculpture, dance, music, architecture. Unlike opera, which is a (virtually) frozen art form, the cinema is and has been a fruitfully conservative medium of ideas and styles of emotions.” KindHas BeensArtIdeasUseFormEmotionNovelStylePaintingTheaterConservativeArchitectureMediumsCinemaMovieOperaFrozenSculptureDance Music Author:Susan Sontag
“When you write a book, you want to have fidelity to the character. Characters and their emotions guide the structure of the novel. The author is aware that there's a certain amount of information she/he has to provide in order to satisfy the reader, knowing that she/he has set something up that must be paid off, but this payment must be made while maintaining fidelity to the characters.” WantWritingMadeBookCharacterCertainOrderEmotionNovelKnowingInformationReaderAmountPaidStructureGuidesMaintainingPaymentFidelityPaid Off Author:David Bezmozgis
“When you write a book, you want to have fidelity to the character. Characters and their emotions guide the structure of the novel.” WantWritingBookCharacterEmotionNovelStructureGuidesFidelity Author:David Bezmozgis
“I am persuaded that not a novel in ten thousand is of any use to a child to fit him for life. The most are of use only to unfit him -- to blunt his senses and infect him with the writers' poor silly sentiments. Nine out of ten novelists deserve to be prosecuted under an Adulterated Emotions Act.” ChildrenUsePoorEmotionNovelFitThousandTenDeserveSillySensesNineNovelistsSentimentsBlunt Author:Storm Jameson
“My books are based on emotions, feelings, relationships. In these areas women are experts, so it's not strange that the main characters of my novels are females.” BookCharacterFeelingsEmotionNovelStrangeAreasFemaleExpertsMain CharactersEmotions Feelings Author:Isabel Allende
“I certainly incorporate facts into my fiction. I take the basic facts from the life of my subject and I pick and choose what to use to construct a really interesting novel. I don't let facts get in the way of my imagination and my exploration of the subject's emotions and relationships.” WayFactsUseImaginationInterestingEmotionFictionNovelSubjectsPicksExplorationConstructsMy ImaginationReally Interesting Author:Melanie Benjamin
“An image often propels the novel, gets it started. For me, it's an image that has a lot of emotion connected to it.” EmotionNovelConnected Author:Will Hobbs
“Sometimes when a character in a novel is difficult for me to enter, I sue something in myself or in my own life as a doorway into that character's mind and emotions.” MindSometimesCharacterDifficultMy OwnEmotionNovelMy Own LifeDoorways Author:Marge Piercy
“The novel may stimulate you to think. It may satisfy your aesthetic sense. It may arouse your moral emotions. But if it does not entertain you it is a bad novel.” IfsThinkingMayDoeEmotionMoralNovelAesthetic Author:W. Somerset Maugham