Best Nonfiction Quotes | Short & Famous Sayings Page 13

“We like nonfiction, and we live in fictitious times.”

“Nonfiction-wha t the hell, that just says, this is nongrapefruit we're having this morning.”

“I did not set out to write another novel. One day I sat down with the thought of trying my hand at a piece of nonfiction, a personal memoir of youth, but over the next several weeks, without intending it, the work began evolving into what has become 'Tomcat in Love.”

Writing Trying Hands Next Novel Pieces Week Youth One Day Memoir Evolve Sat Nonfiction

Author:Tim O'Brien

“I read nonfiction almost exclusively - both for research and also for pleasure. When I read fiction, it's almost always in the thriller genre, and it needs to rivet me in the opening few chapters.”

Needs Pleasure Fiction Research Opening Genre Nonfiction Chapters Thrillers Fiction And Nonfiction Thriller Genre

Author:Dan Brown

“I've been making 16mm urban landscape films about San Francisco for many years. I choose different nonfiction themes to investigate and am generally interested in surfacing lesser-known histories. I like to investigate and illuminate these histories, combining them with my own unconventional storytelling style, which is generally a stream-of-consciousness voiceover involving a steady stream of personal reflections on pining over unavailable women.”

“When you start reading nonfiction books about piracy, you realize that it's actually just a history of desperate people.”

People Book Reading Realizing Desperate Nonfiction Piracy

Author:Daniel Handler

“I never wanted to be an editor. I never wanted to be a boss. I just wanted to write, and it didn't make any difference whether it was fiction or nonfiction or short stories or whatever. I just - that's what I was destined to do.”

Writing Stories Wanted Differences Fiction Boss Editors Short Story Nonfiction Destined

Author:Frank Deford

“I remember reading an interview with a writer who said that in nonfiction if you have one lie it sort of messes it up. But in fiction the real details give you so much more credibility, because people do so much research just to write fiction. In fiction you're trying to recreate something lifelike.”

People Ifs Giving Writing Trying Said Real Remember Lying Reading Fiction Research Details Mess Interviews Nonfiction Credibility

Author:Edwidge Danticat

“After writing fiction for so long, I like the discovery element of nonfiction, in the sense that when you find the right information, it feels like gold.”

Feels Writing Long Fiction Information Elements Discovery Gold Nonfiction Writing Fiction

Author:Edwidge Danticat

“I feel like I'm almost ready to write fiction about the border. But even after 10 years of writing nonfiction about it, I don't think I know quite enough to do it right.”

Thinking Knows Feels Writing Years Enough Fiction Ready Borders Nonfiction Writing Nonfiction

Author:William T. Vollmann

“The truth is that every writer, whether it's fiction or nonfiction, is trying to write something truly original and that's what I think I'm doing.”

Thinking Writing Trying Fiction Truth Is Originals Nonfiction

Author:Lisa Scottoline

“Good writing is good writing no matter what genre you're writing in, and I believe that there are only a handful of fundamental craft tools that are essential for any genre-including nonfiction.”

Writing Believe Matter I Believe Essentials Tools No Matter What Fundamentals Including Crafts Genre Nonfiction Handful Good Writing

Author:Georgia Heard

“People like nonfiction presented to them in a certain way, so that they don't have to think about whether it's true or not. They like it to have that imprimatur of respectability, of genuineness.”

People Thinking Way Certain Nonfiction Respectability Genuineness

Author:Errol Morris

“The act of writing should not be accompanied by the sense of an audience, someone peering over your shoulder, but in nonfiction I think it’s almost imperative that you identify an audience so you can confirm or challenge or undermine whatever ideas or prejudices they might have about your subject.”

Thinking Should Writing Ideas Might Challenges Audience Subjects Prejudice Shoulders Over You Nonfiction Imperatives

Author:Pankaj Mishra

“I don't like to read nonfiction. To me, fact is something I can look up.”

Looks I Can Facts Look Up Nonfiction

Author:Fran Lebowitz

“Nonfiction, qua label, is nothing more or less than a very flexible (easily breakable) frame that allows you to pull the thing away from narrative and toward contemplation, which is all I've ever wanted.”

Wanted Labels Narrative Contemplation Nonfiction Flexible

Book:Reality Hunger

Source: Reality Hunger

“It's very bad to write a novel by act of will. I can do a book of nonfiction work that way - just sign the contract and do the book because, provided the topic has some meaning for me, I know I can do it. But a novel is different. A novel is more like falling in love. You don't say, 'I'm going to fall in love next Tuesday, I'm going to begin my novel.' The novel has to come to you. It has to feel just like love.”

Knows Way Feels Writing I Can Book Different Fall Next Can Do Novel Love You Falling In Love Contracts Nonfiction Topics Tuesday I Can Do It Like Love Feels Just

Author:Norman Mailer

“People and places are the twin pillars on which most nonfiction is built. Every human event happens somewhere, and the reader wants to know what that somewhere was like.”

People Knows Want Humans Happens Events Reader Built Nonfiction Twins Pillars

Author:William Zinsser

“Nonfiction brought me back to earth and sobered me up whenever it seemed like I'd become too drunk on the lives and loves of imaginary people, but that doesn't mean it was any less thrilling or transporting, although it was often more illuminating.”

People Mean Earth And Love Drunk Nonfiction Imaginary Life And Love Thrilling Illuminating

Author:Laura Miller

“When people ask what kind of nonfiction I write, I say 'all kinds,' but really I mean I don’t write any kind at all: I’m trying to dissolve the borders between memoir and journalism and criticism by weaving them together.”

People Writing Trying Kind Mean Together Asks Criticism Memoir All Kinds Journalism Borders Nonfiction Weaving

Author:Leslie Jamison

“Nonfiction writers are second-class citizens, the Ellis Island of literature. We just can't quite get in. And yes, it pisses me off.”

Literature Class Citizens Islands Nonfiction Second Class Citizens Ellis Island

Author:William Styron

“Politically I also don't believe anymore that we can only have one voice to a story, it's like having one radio station to represent a country. You want the politics of any complicated situation to be complicated in a book of fiction or nonfiction.”

Want Believe Book Country Stories Voice Fiction Situation Don't Believe Radio Complicated Stations Nonfiction Radio Stations

Author:Michael Ondaatje

“After the Dance was my first attempt at nonfiction. I'd never really participated in carnival, and I really wanted to go. It sounded like a wonderfully fun thing to do. And I wanted to write something happy about Haiti, something celebratory. And going to carnival gave me a chance to do that, because it is one of the instances in Haiti when people shed their class separation and come together.”

People Writing Firsts Wanted Together Fun Chance Class Separation Instance Things To Do Nonfiction Shed Haiti Fun Things Carnivals

Author:Edwidge Danticat

“Ironically, in today's marketplace successful nonfiction has to be unbelievable, while successful fiction must be believable.”

Today Fiction Successful Nonfiction Unbelievable Marketplace Believable Fiction And Nonfiction

Author:Jerry B. Jenkins

“In the best nonfiction, it seems to me, you're always made aware that you are being engaged with a supple mind at work. The story line or plot in nonfiction consists of the twists and turns of a thought process working itself out.”

Mind Made Stories Seems Turns Process Lines Engaged Plot Nonfiction Twists Thought Process Supple Twists And Turns

Book:To Show and to Tell: The Craft of Literary Nonfiction

Source: To Show and to Tell: The Craft of Literary Nonfiction

“I haven't written a whole lot of nonfiction, but what I have written leads me to believe that it's an entirely different muscle. The ongoing paradox is that sometimes it's harder to get to the emotional truth of something when you only have the facts at your disposal.”

Believe Different Sometimes Whole Facts Written Havens Emotional Harder Muscles Paradox Nonfiction Ongoing Leading Me

Author:Ron Currie Jr.

“Though I consider The Chronology of Water to be an anti-memoir for very precise reasons, it is an art form, and thus as open to "critique" as any other art form. Memoir has a form, formal strategies, issues of composition and craft, style, structure, all the elements of fiction or nonfiction or painting or music or what have you.”

Art Reason Form Water Fiction Issues Style Painting Elements Strategy Structure Memoir Crafts Nonfiction Composition Formal Precise Critique Chronology

Author:Lidia Yuknavitch

“The funny thing is that in Bosnia there are no words that are equivalent to fiction and nonfiction. From the storytelling point of view, the difference is artificial.”

Differences Views Fiction Point Of View Storytelling Nonfiction Artificial Funny Things Bosnia Fiction And Nonfiction

Author:Aleksandar Hemon

“For me, a memoir is nonfiction and nonfiction has to be absolutely true.”

Memoir Nonfiction

Author:Akhil Sharma

“I need to tell the things that are important but which don't make sense in terms of the narrative, things that would destroy symmetry or narrative pace. This is my personal belief about what it means to write nonfiction.”

Needs Writing Mean Important Belief Term Narrative Make Sense Pace Nonfiction Symmetry Personal Beliefs

Author:Akhil Sharma

“One of the reasons so many nonfiction books are so boring is because what they've done, very diligently, is fulfill the terms of their proposals. They've written up their proposal, long-form, and often what this does is then set up a sort of serial deal, where the whole book can essentially be reduced back to the size of the original proposal!”

Long Doe Book Reason Done Whole Form Term Deals Written Originals Size Boring Nonfiction Proposal Serials So Boring

Author:Geoff Dyer

“What I'm really interested in, as a reader and as a writer, is the idea of the nonfiction book that is not defined by its content, by its "about"-ness. Where you read it irrespective of whether you're interested in the subject.”

Book Ideas Subjects Reader Defined Nonfiction

Author:Geoff Dyer

“Starting the blog was a way for me to generate this nonfiction first-person voice naturally, gradually, without feeling performance anxiety. It felt a bit like keeping journals when I was younger, but connecting to an instant readership without having to wait for publication made it also immediately satisfying.”

“As a writer who writes poetry, nonfiction, and fiction, I think it's important to always maintain a firm grasp on genre and ethics.”

Thinking Writing Important Fiction Ethics Genre Firm Nonfiction

Author:Kathleen Rooney

“In early drafts, one of the trickiest things for me to do was to realize that the techniques and devices that make readable and compelling nonfiction are not always identical to the ones that make good fiction.”

Realizing Fiction Technique Devices Nonfiction Compelling Identical

Author:Kathleen Rooney

“If a reader believes that everything in nonfiction or history is just objectively true, I don't really know what to tell them, except that at least in fiction, the choice of what perspective and bias to tell a given story from - which is always a deliberate choice - is foregrounded and clear.”

Ifs Knows Believe Stories Choices Given Fiction Clear Perspective Reader Nonfiction Bias Deliberate

Author:Kathleen Rooney

“With the historical fictions, I was already doing so much research, and so much of the stories was anchored by historical truth that the move to nonfiction didn't feel all that dramatic - just another half-step to the right.”

Feels Stories Moving Half Fiction Steps Research Historical Dramatic Historical Fiction Nonfiction Historical Truth

Author:Debra Dean

“If anything, I've found nonfiction a little easier. You don't have to make anything up. Of course, that's the inherent difficulty as well: when you hit an information black hole, you don't get to make it up. That hasn't come up too often with this project though. I'm lucky to have tons of primary source material , reams of letters and diaries and memoirs.”

Ifs Wells Littles Courses Found Black Information Materials Source Easier Lucky Projects Letters Difficulty Come Up Holes Memoir Primaries Nonfiction Inherent Diaries Black Hole Primary Source

Author:Debra Dean

“The DNA of the novel - which, if I begin to write nonfiction, I will write about this - is that: the title of the novel is the whole novel. The first line of the novel is the whole novel. The point of view is the whole novel. Every subplot is the whole novel. The verb tense is the whole novel.”

Ifs Writing Firsts Whole Lines Views Novel Point Of View Titles Nonfiction Dna Tense Verbs Subplots

Author:Mary Kay Zuravleff

“Fiction is more dangerous than nonfiction because it can seduce better. I think we all know this, know that deeper truths can be approached in fiction than in fact. There are risks for the reader, because after reading certain books you find you have changed irreversibly. There are risks for writers: in China, now, and Ethiopia and other countries right now, writers face real persecution.”

“Sometimes it bursts from your imagination fully formed, sometimes you absorb from nonfiction, sometimes you're able to imprint your own autobiographical experiences on a world you never yourself were a part of. A decent number of the one-liners in the title story originally came up in conversations with my girlfriend or my neighbor.”

World Sometimes Stories Able Imagination Numbers Conversation Neighbor Titles Girlfriend Decent Nonfiction My Girlfriend One Liner

Author:Anthony Marra

“This is one of the ways fiction is more liberating than nonfiction - I don't have to be so concerned with fact. I had the paradigm of certain people in my head who became my characters, but I never considered these people to be from a "certain sector of society," unless we agree that we're all from certain sectors of society.”

People Way Character Facts Certain Fiction Concerned Agree Nonfiction Liberating Paradigm

Author:Said Sayrafiezadeh

“Nonfiction ties your hands a bit, and just like writing poetry in rhyme, it can force you to make more brutal decisions in terms of word choice, plot, etc.”

Writing Hands Choices Force Bits Term Decision Ties Etc Plot Nonfiction Brutal Rhyme Writing Poetry Word Choice

Author:Emily Susan Rapp

“When I was in college I started writing prose, because a very smart professor asked me what I like to read and I said, "Novels," and she said, "You should be writing them then." Memoir never even occurred to me. I think I was afraid of nonfiction and I was afraid of navel-gazing, and of being seen.”

Thinking Should Writing Said Novel College Smart Memoir Prose Professors Nonfiction Gazing Very Smart Navel Navel Gazing

Author:Melissa Febos

“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.”

Thinking Writing Wells Book Reason Stories Process My Own Decision Answers Fiction Happened Needed Overwhelming Nonfiction Publishing Reduction Impetus Pseudonyms

Author:Melissa Febos

“The other reason I didn't want to fictionalize it is because one of the main points of publishing a memoir in nonfiction was that I wanted to write about what had been a very lonely experience. The books that most saved my life as a kid were the ones that articulated lonely experiences that I had thought were mine alone.”

Want Writing Book Reason Kids Wanted Mines Lonely Saved Memoir Nonfiction Publishing

Author:Melissa Febos

“People seem to want to read more nonfiction than fiction.”

People Want Seems Fiction Nonfiction

Author:Bonnie Jo Campbell

“I'm just too lazy. I wish I could be someone that has wild affairs - all of my favorite nonfiction novels are about these wild affairs and postmarital agonistes - but to be honest, I'm someone that doesn't deal well with instability.”

Wells Wish Deals Novel Honest Affair My Favorite Being Honest Lazy Nonfiction Instability

Author:Kate Zambreno

“The nonfiction novel or literary memoir as authored by women is usually given a much harder time in mainstream criticism.”

Given Novel Criticism Harder Memoir Nonfiction Mainstream

Author:Kate Zambreno

“A lot of attention has been paid in Latin America to the new generation of nonfiction writers, authors like Julio Villanueva Chang, Diego Osorno, Cristóbal Peña, Gabriela Wiener, Leila Guerriero, Cristian Alarcón, among others. These are writers doing important, groundbreaking work. So the talent is there, as is the habit of radio listenership, and what we propose to do is unite the two. We want to have these immensely gifted journalists - men and women who've already revitalized the long-form narrative - we want them to tell their stories in sound.”

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Nonfiction Quotes