“I consider myself an essayist and a fiction writer. In the essays, I certainly have been influenced by some of the leading science essayists. Like Loren Eiseley, Stephen Jay Gould, Lewis Thomas.” Has BeensFictionEssaysFiction WritersEssayistsJay Gould Author:Alan Lightman
“That's the fine balance of a fiction writer...to be able to give your characters enough freedom to surprise you and yet still maintain some kind of artistic control.” GivingKindStillsEnoughCharacterAbleFictionFineBalanceSurpriseArtisticFiction Writers Author:Alan Lightman
“I was clasified as a 'Science Fiction' writer simply because I wrote about Schenectady.” FictionScience FictionFiction Writers Author:Kurt Vonnegut
“Perhaps the rediscovery of our humanity, and the potential of the human spirit which we have read about in legends of older civilizations, or in accounts of solitary mystics, or in tales of science fiction writers - perhaps this will constitute the true revolution of the future. The new frontier lies not beyond the planets but within each one of us.” HumansSpiritLyingHumanityFictionPlanetsRevolutionCivilizationAccountsScience FictionTalesLegendsSolitaryHuman SpiritFrontiersFiction WritersNew FrontiersRediscovery Author:Pierre Trudeau
“I am an old-fashioned storyteller. I try to make people laugh and cry. A fiction writer's duty is to entertain. If you can sneak in something profound or symbolic, so much the better.” PeopleIfsTryingFictionLaughingCryDutyProfoundStorytellerOld FashionedSymbolicMaking People LaughSneakFiction WritersSneak In Author:W. P. Kinsella
“What I'm doing is exploring things. This is why I'm a fiction writer rather than an essayist or a politician or whatever. I just gather material and find a scenario, and see where it takes me. I don't have a plan.” FictionPlansMaterialsPoliticianTake MeExploringScenariosFiction WritersEssayists Author:T.C. Boyle
“I believe that I am some sort of fiction writer and I'm using myself in my work because I'm the person I'm most convenient to use!” BelievePersonsUseI BelieveFictionConvenientFiction Writers Author:Laurel Nakadate
“If asked to list my ten favorite American fiction writers, Gail Godwin would be among them. In this, her latest . . . she evokes in a short book the long married life of two artists. Evenings at Five is a strong tale of love-after-death.” IfsLongTwoBookWould BeArtistStrongFictionFiveTenMarriedListsTalesEveningAfter DeathEvokeFiction WritersMarried LifeGail Author:Ned Rorem
“I don't think I'm more of a screenwriter than I am a fiction writer. I'm more of a reader than a film-watcher, so I imagine that I'm not approaching fiction or films in a particularly cinematic way.” ThinkingWayFilmFictionImagineReaderImagine ThatScreenwritersFiction WritersCinematicWatchers Author:Miranda July
“And while dollars have little to do with it, the fiction writer should be asking the same question any capable film producer would ask: Is this scene truly necessary? It is the kind of thinking that, put into practice, results in a story with a sense of energy and direction.” ThinkingShouldKindLittlesStoriesFilmAsksEnergyResultsFictionPracticeSceneCapableAskingDollarsProducersFiction Writers Author:Les Standiford
“A couple of hundred years from now, maybe [science fiction writers] Isaac Asimov and Fred Pohl will be considered the important philosophers of the twentieth century, and the professional philosophers will almost all be forgotten, because they're just shallow and wrong, and their ideas aren't very powerful.” YearsImportantIdeasPowerfulFictionCenturyCoupleHundredScience FictionForgottenPhilosopherShallowTwentieth CenturyVery PowerfulFiction WritersIsaac Author:Marvin Minsky
“I was on a panel with light skinned Blacks and a famous gay science fiction writer, who were complaining about how Blacks are against gays and light skinned Blacks and how intolerant Blacks are of different groups. My position was that Blacks were among the most humanistic, tolerant groups in the country and that across the street from my house in Oakland was one inhabited by White gays.” DifferentCountryLightHouseWhiteFictionGroupsStreetsPositionGayScience FictionComplainingFiction WritersHumanisticOakland Author:Ishmael Reed
“When you're not doing fiction, there's a limit to how much illustrating you can do with your work. I mean, you can do fine. There are great non-fiction writers, but people aren't necessarily going to say anything that reveals them as much as a picture might. Even their surroundings, in lot of cases, the things that meant the most to me were the things I noticed in their houses. I was always looking, as much as I was listening to them. I was looking around for clues as to why I was there.” PeopleMeanMightHouseCan DoFictionCasesListeningFineLimitsSay AnythingClueSurroundingsNon FictionFiction WritersIllustrating Author:Miranda July
“As a fiction writer, of course, you need to take some leeway with certain aspects of history to make the story work.” NeedsStoriesCertainCoursesFictionAspectFiction Writers Author:Joseph Boyden
“In terms of writing, I think what most fiction writers treasure more than anything is the feeling that they're living for the length of a book inside another person.” ThinkingWritingPersonsBookFeelingsTermFictionTreasureLengthFiction Writers Author:Lauren Groff
“I was joking earlier when I said that all writers are manic depressives, but it's a joke with a lot of truth behind it. For fiction writers and poets, too, there's something wrong with you and you do this art as a way of correcting it or addressing it in some way.” WayArtSaidBehindsFictionPoetTruth IsJokesFiction WritersCorrectingManicWriters And Poets Author:T.C. Boyle
“The challenge for any fiction writer is that your job involves simply sitting at a desk for a very, very long time.” LongJobsChallengesFictionLong TimeSittingDesksFiction Writers Author:Chad Harbach
“Much to my surprise, there's a sense for people in the cable industry that fiction writers might actually be good at script writing. You can write dialogue!” PeopleWritingMightFictionIndustrySurpriseScriptsBe GoodDialogueCablesFiction Writers Author:Matthew Specktor
“That's why I have to be a fiction writer, because I can't remember what just happened or where I went last week or what movie I just watched with my husband. I'm better off just making things up.” I CanLastsRememberFictionHappenedWeekHusbandMy HusbandBetter OffBecause I CanFiction Writers Author:Bonnie Jo Campbell
“I was a big fan of a writer named Jack Vance, a science fiction writer. He always wrote about these guys who were either going down a river in a strange world or would be in this one land where people acted really strange, and he'd have these interactions with them that were strange - he'd usually get run out of town or something. Then he'd end up in the next town over where the rules were totally different. And I love this stuff.” PeopleWorldDifferentEndsBigsWould BeRunningGuyNextStuffFictionFansLandStrangeRiversTownsScience FictionInteractionFiction WritersStrange World Author:Bela Fleck
“I'm not a science fiction writer, I'm a physicist. These are scientists who are making the future in their laboratories.” FictionScientistScience FictionPhysicistLaboratoryFiction Writers Author:Michio Kaku
“When I taught at the University of Houston in the Creative Writing program we required the poets to take workshops in fiction writing and we required the fiction writers to take workshops in poetry. And the reason for that is because the fiction writers seemed to need to learn how to pay greater attention to language itself, to the way that language works.” WayNeedsWritingReasonLanguagePayAttentionFictionCreativeGreaterTaughtPoetProgramUniversityCreative WritingWorkshopsFiction WritingFiction WritersHouston Author:Edward Hirsch
“That is many poets don't know how to tell a story and they don't have a sense of how to put things in order to tell a story and we thought the poets could learn from fiction writers something about developing a character over time who wasn't just you and also creating a narrative structure.” KnowsCharacterStoriesOrderFictionKnow HowPoetCreatingStructureDevelopingNarrativeFiction WritersNarrative Structure Author:Edward Hirsch
“I think the deepest thing is that many fiction writers tell stories but are not elegant writers. But, we're not writing journalism when we're making literature.” ThinkingWritingStoriesLiteratureFictionJournalismElegantFiction Writers Author:Edward Hirsch
“We're trying to make something that lasts in language and there's no question that many fiction writers began as poets and it's hard for me to think of any good fiction writers who don't also read poetry.” ThinkingTryingHardLastsLanguageFictionPoetFiction Writers Author:Edward Hirsch
“Fiction writers learn about the development of metaphor, the use of rhythm, the way that language is compacted in order to express the feelings of - express their own feelings and the feelings of their characters.” WayCharacterUseFeelingsOrderLanguageFictionDevelopmentMetaphorRhythmFiction Writers Author:Edward Hirsch
“As a fiction writer, that's been a preoccupation of mine: Can you really just close the door and leave the past back there behind you, or is the door going to blow open at some point?” PastBehindsFictionDoorsMinesBlowBehind YouPreoccupationFiction WritersLeaving The Past Author:Dani Shapiro
“My father taught me to love detective fiction writers such as Raymond Chandler. When I decided to have a hard-boiled detective series I did a lot of studying before I wrote the first book. I learned police procedure, the California criminal law, and many areas outside my expertise.” FirstsBookHardLawFatherFictionStudyTaughtAreasDecidedPoliceSeriesCriminalsCaliforniaProceduresDetectivesExpertiseFiction WritersCriminal LawDetective Fiction Author:Sue Grafton
“I think I view myself primarily as a fiction writer. Poetry is more of a "hobby," a time of rest from the hard work of writing fiction.” ThinkingWritingHardViewsFictionHard WorkPoetry IsHobbiesFiction WritersWriting Fiction Author:Yuriy Tarnawsky
“As a fiction writer, one of things you learn is God lives in specificity. You know, human kindness is increased as we pursue specificity.” KnowsHumansFictionKindnessPursueFiction WritersGod LifeHuman KindnessSpecificity Author:George Saunders
“I was looking at a lot of experimental writers, and I was very intrigued by short-short fiction, writers who would write little things, what I call buttons now, little vignettes.” WritingLittlesFictionLittle ThingsButtonsIntriguedFiction WritersVignettes Author:Sandra Cisneros
“I remember I was very taken with a book called DreamTigers by [Jorge Luis] Borges. He was at the University of Texas, Austin, and they collected some of his writings and put them in a little collection. It's called DreamTigers in English, but it doesn't exist in Spanish. It's a little sampler. But that collection in English is what struck me, because in there he has his poems, and I was a poet as well as a fiction writer.” WritingWellsLittlesBookRememberFictionTakenPoetUniversityCollectionsTexasFiction WritersAustinBorgesUniversity Of Texas Author:Sandra Cisneros
“I like to mix it up, because the kind of comments you can get from a fiction writer about your poetry are going to be very different than what you'll get from a poet.” KindDifferentFictionPoetCommentFiction Writers Author:Sandra Cisneros
“Futurism today is led by science-fiction writers, by sociologists, by historians. Now, I have nothing against them. I'm sure they do great work. But they're not scientists. They're clueless.” TodayFictionScientistScience FictionHistorianGreat WorkFiction WritersCluelessSociologistsFuturism Author:Michio Kaku
“One of my favourite contemporary fiction writers is a Texan, Ben Fountain. His extraordinary novel, Billy Lynn's Long Half-Time Walk, all takes place within the half-time show at a Dallas Cowboys football game. No one has better summed up the American appetite for spectacle, the link between sports and politics, and the absolute madness of George W. Bush's Iraq War.” LongWarShowsGamesSportsWalksHalfFictionNovelFootballMadnessAbsolutesExtraordinaryIraqContemporaryLinksAppetiteFavouriteCowboyFountainIraq WarFiction WritersDallasContemporary FictionFootball GameTexanHalf TimeDallas Cowboy Author:Adam Hochschild
“It's a scary thing for fiction writers, when you're always writing from the point of view both as and for someone who is different.” WritingDifferentViewsFictionScaryPoint Of ViewFiction WritersScary Things Author:Alice Mattison
“Fiction writers have their own world, and poets have their own world, and literary criticism has sort of passed over into cultural studies in the university, and so on. They seem more disconnected from each other than they did when I first began to write.” WorldWritingFirstsSeemsFictionStudyPoetCriticismUniversityFiction WritersDisconnectedLiterary Criticism Author:Robert Hass
“I always wanted to be a fiction writer, but I couldn't figure out how you could be a novelist and make any money, which continues to be a problem for novelists the world over.” WorldProblemWantedFictionFiguresNovelistsFiction Writers Author:Anna Quindlen
“In effect, I grew up in a sort of timewarp, a place where times are scrambled up. There are elements of my childhood that look to me now, in memory more like the 1940s or the 1950s than the 1960s. Jack [Womack] says that that made us science fiction writers, because we grew up experiencing a kind of time travel.” LooksKindMadeMemoriesFictionChildhoodEffectsGrewElementsGrew UpScience FictionTime Travel1960sFiction Writers Author:William Gibson
“I'm repledging myself to human-scale values. As a fiction writer, the best data comes through the senses and is then processed through many revisions. We have to learn to be intelligent assessors of the data coming in to us and what it's doing to our mental process.” HumansValuesProcessFictionIntelligentSensesScalesDataFiction WritersRevision Author:George Saunders
“I'm sure there's an alternate universe where I got to become a pulpy science fiction writer.” UniverseFictionScience FictionFiction Writers Author:Neil Gaiman
“When I have a writing workshop, I like to have people that are anthropologists and people who are poking around in other fields, I like to have them all in the same workshop, and not worry about genre. I like to mix it up, because the kind of comments you can get from a fiction writer about your poetry are going to be very different than what you'll get from a poet. Or the comments you'll get from a filmmaker about your performance are going to be very different. My writing workshop is about mixing it up, cross-pollinating, not only in genres but in occupations.” PeopleWritingKindDifferentFictionWorryFieldsPoetCrossesPerformancesGenreFilmmakerOccupationCommentMixingWorkshopsFiction WritersAnthropologistsWriting WorkshopMixing It Up Author:Sandra Cisneros
“I don't think the function of writing, at least for me as a fiction writer, is to say to people, "Here's the answer." It's not an op-ed.” PeopleThinkingWritingAnswersFictionFunctionFiction Writers Author:Mohsin Hamid
“A lot of the despair we feel watching the news every day flows from our sense of helplessness, and as a fiction writer you get to control things, if only on the page. You get to run the show. You can right wrongs, bring departed loved ones back to life, even take vengeance on God, if that's your thing.” IfsFeelsShowsRunningFictionDespairNewsPagesFlowLoved OnesVengeanceHelplessnessFiction WritersDeparted Author:Ron Currie Jr.
“My motto is: write about anything you bloody well like; just make sure you do it effectively. We've all had all the emotions, the rest is research and that leap which some can do and others cannot - it's not really something you can learn, otherwise all academics of literature would be wonderful fiction writers.” WritingWellsWould BeLiteratureCan DoEmotionFictionWonderfulResearchLeapBloodyMottoFiction WritersMy Motto Author:Suhayl Saadi
“Fiction is in danger of becoming a kind of poetry. Only other poets read it. Only other fiction writers care about it.” KindCareFictionDangerPoetBecomingFiction Writers Author:John Updike
“I think it is our job, as writers, to be epic. Epic and tiny at the same time. If you're going to be a fiction writer, why not take on something that means something. In doing this, you must understand that within that epic structure it is the tiny story that is possibly more important.” IfsThinkingMeanImportantStoriesJobsFictionStructureTinyWhy NotEpicFiction Writers Author:Colum McCann
“As a fiction writer you train yourself to think about situations subjectively. I don't really care for narratives that are just A, B, C, D, and then E. I like the aura that fiction has, how it can conjure up dream imagery. It's a sort of emotional speculation that you can shape and work with.” ThinkingDreamCareFictionSituationEmotionalShapesTrainNarrativeSpeculationImageryFiction WritersAuras Author:Oscar Hijuelos
“If I write a paragraph and I don't get a certain lift from it, if I don't feel connected to it emotionally, then it's dead to me. When I'm reading other fiction writers, if I don't get any emotional investment from the writer, if it's just intellectual or clever - you know, most writing that passes as deep is just clever - I don't feel any connection.” IfsKnowsFeelsWritingCertainReadingFictionEmotionalIntellectualConnectionsInvestmentConnectedCleverLiftsParagraphFiction WritersEmotional Investment Author:Oscar Hijuelos
“Incidentally, I am intrigued by how many European and Latin American writers expressed their political views in the columns they routinely wrote or write in the popular press, like Saramago, Vargas Llosa, and Eco. This strikes me as one way of avoiding opinionated fiction, and allowing your imagination a broader latitude. Similarly, fiction writers from places like India and Pakistan are commonly expected to provide primers to their country's histories and present-day conflicts. But we haven't had that tradition in Anglo-America.” WayWritingCountryAmericaPoliticalImaginationViewsFictionHavensConflictTraditionIndiaPressesExpectedStrikesOne WayLatinAllowingAvoidingPakistanColumnsLatin AmericaIntriguedPresent DayFiction WritersEcoOpinionatedAmerican WriterLatitudePolitical ViewLatin AmericanIndia And Pakistan Author:Pankaj Mishra