“As a novelist, I mined my history, my family and my memory, but in a very specific way. Writing fiction, I never made use of experiences immediately as they happened. I needed to let things fester in my memory, mature and transmogrify into something meaningful.” WayWritingMadeUseMemoriesFictionHappenedNeededMy FamilyMeaningfulNovelistsMatureWriting Fiction Author:Ayelet Waldman
“I like to read biographies of authors that I love, like Richard Yates. I also like to see what non-fiction authors are out there. My bible is Something Happened. It's one of the greatest books I've ever read. But if I don't read a Dostoevsky soon I'm going to kill myself.” IfsBookFictionHappenedBiographiesNon FictionGreatest Book Author:Richard Lewis
“If all stories are fiction, fiction can be true -- not in detail or fact, but in some transformed version of feeling. If there is a memory of paradise, paradise can exist, in some other place or country dimensionally reminiscent of our own. The sad stories live there too, but in that country, we know what they mean and why they happened. We make our way back from them, finding the way through a bountiful wilderness we begin to understand. Years are nothing: Story conquers all distance.” IfsKnowsWayYearsMeanCountryFactsStoriesFeelingsMemoriesFictionHappenedFindingsDistanceDetailsVersionsBeing TrueConquerParadiseWildernessTransformedSad Story Author:Jayne Anne Phillips
“I think the least important thing about science fiction for me is its predictive capacity. Its record for being accurately predictive is really, really poor! If you look at the whole history of science fiction, what people have said is going to happen, what writers have said is going to happen, and what actually happened - it's terrible.” PeopleIfsThinkingLooksSaidImportantWholeHappensPoorFictionRecordsHappenedTerribleCapacityImportant ThingsScience FictionHistory Of Science Author:William Gibson
“I love memoirs, particularly obscure ones because the writer is usually a regular guy just telling what happened to him and to his friends. What these tales lack in artfulness they make up for in passion and authenticity. For a writer of fiction, they are solid gold. I have stolen so much from memoirs it's ridiculous.” GuyPassionFictionHappenedGoldRidiculousTalesMemoirAuthenticityObscureStolen Author:Steven Pressfield
“I was just about to begin writing Mirror Mirror, within about a week of it, when September 11, 2001 happened. I found myself incapable of caring about fiction-making for a number of months.” WritingFoundNumbersFictionHappenedWeekMonthsMirrorsCaringSeptemberIncapableSeptember 11September 11 2001 Author:Gregory Maguire
“Fiction is lies; we're writing about people who never existed and events that never happened when we write fiction, whether its science fiction or fantasy or western mystery stories or so-called literary stories. All those things are essentially untrue. But it has to have a truth at the core of it.” PeopleWritingStoriesLyingFictionFantasyHappenedMysteryEventsScience FictionWesternCoreUntrue Author:George R. R. Martin
“With non-fiction writing I feel like I'm confined and driven by what actually happened. That makes the "plot". So it's a process of getting all of my notes typed up, then scanning through the notes, trying to extract or find certain vignettes that seem like they might write well - that might have a potential for good energy, shape, etc. And then at some point I start stringing these together, keeping an eye on the word count.” FeelsWritingTryingWellsSeemsMightEyeTogetherCertainEnergyProcessFictionHappenedShapesNotesDrivenEtcPlotConfinedNon FictionFiction WritingGood EnergyScanningVignettes Author:George Saunders
“The subject of a novel is not the plot. Who remembers what happened to Lucien de Rebempre in the end?” EndsRememberFictionNovelHappenedSubjectsPlot Author:Graham Greene
“A favorite science fiction writer of mine is William Faulkner! It was an idea that came to me once, years ago, and I've never quite been able to shake it. This is facetious, on one level at least. There are telepaths in As I Lay Dying. But I think the most compelling thing for me is there are moments with him where I just feel these are not humans talking to each other. These are some hyper-intelligent, yet-to-be-born organisms. The way they look at the past without having any loss of knowledge everything that ever happened is still here.” ThinkingWayFeelsYearsHumansLooksStillsIdeasMomentsAblePastBornLossLevelsFictionTalkingHappenedDyingMinesYears AgoIntelligentScience FictionLaysShakesCompellingOrganismsNever QuitFiction WritersHyperFacetious Author:Robert Reed
“I don't think "I'm going to publish this as fiction" but I think "I'm going to tell this story to a friend" and then I start telling the story in my mind as the experience transpires as a way of pretending it's already happened.” ThinkingWayMindStoriesFictionHappenedPretendingPublish Author:Ben Lerner
“When you're writing a book that is going to be a narrative with characters and events, you're walking very close to fiction, since you're using some of the methods of fiction writing. You're lying, but some of the details may well come from your general recollection rather than from the particular scene. In the end it comes down to the readers. If they believe you, you're OK. A memoirist is really like any other con man; if he's convincing, he's home. If he isn't, it doesn't really matter whether it happened, he hasn't succeeded in making it feel convincing.” IfsMenFeelsWritingBelieveWellsMayBookEndsMatterCharacterHomeLyingFictionHappenedEventsParticularReaderWalkingSceneMethodDetailsNarrativeConvincingWriting A BookRecollectionFiction Writing Author:Samuel Hynes
“Science fiction, as I mentioned before, writes about what is neither impossible nor possible; the fact is that, when the question of possibility comes up in science fiction, the author can only reply that nobody knows. We haven't been there yet. We haven't discovered that yet. Science fiction hasn't happened.” KnowsWritingFactsFictionImpossibleHappenedHavensPossibilityScience FictionCome UpNobody Knows Book:To Write Like a Woman: Essays in Feminism and Science Fiction Source: To Write Like a Woman: Essays in Feminism and Science Fiction
“There were a couple times when we started working out the stories - and I was doing this with Jim Vallely and our friend Dean Lorey, who was on the show originally - and we were working on a movie. There would be some fan fiction things that would scoop us. It happened a couple times, where I thought, "Well, we can't do that!"” WellsStoriesShowsWould BeFictionHappenedFansCoupleWork OutDean Author:Mitchell Hurwitz
“Fiction is often a much-needed step back that gives you the distance to see things more clearly; it's very often better at explaining why events happened as opposed to just what happened.” GivingFictionStepsHappenedEventsNeededDistanceExplaining Author:Kathleen Rooney
“I more seriously considered publishing it under a pseudonym than I considered publishing it as fiction. I think the decision to write it as nonfiction happened at the very outset of the process, because the overwhelming impetus for writing this book was to understand what the experience meant, and to override my own reductions and rationalizations, whatever story I had that was not true. It didn't sit well with me and I needed to answer that. That's sort of the reason I write everything.” ThinkingWritingWellsBookReasonStoriesProcessMy OwnDecisionAnswersFictionHappenedNeededOverwhelmingNonfictionPublishingReductionImpetusPseudonyms Author:Melissa Febos
“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'm all about nonfiction. I rarely read fiction. I like to read about things that really happened, facts, real life situations. That's what inspires me.” RealFactsFictionSituationHappenedInspireReal LifeNonfiction Author:Phil Keoghan