“It means that no matter what you write, be it a biography, an autobiography, a detective novel, or a conversation on the street, it all becomes fiction as soon as you write it down.” WritingMeanMatterLiteratureFictionNovelStreetsConversationNo Matter WhatAutobiographyBiographiesDetectivesDetective Fiction Author:Guillermo Cabrera Infante
“In one deep sense, novels are concealed autobiography. I don't mean that you are telling facts about yourself, but you are trying to find out what you really think or who you are.” ThinkingWritingTryingMeanFactsNovelWho You AreAbout YourselfAutobiographyConcealedOne Deep Author:Robert Penn Warren
“There is a part of me in every character, naturally. That's why novelists rarely write good autobiographies. You start one and it becomes another novel.” WritingCharacterNovelNovelistsAutobiography Book:John Dos Passos: the major nonfictional prose Source: John Dos Passos: the major nonfictional prose
“I've told youngsters not to write their autobiographical novel at the age of twenty-one; to save it for the time when they're fifty-one or sixty-one. They should write other novels first, to learn their craft; they shouldn't cut their teeth on the valuable material of childhood because they'll never have better material, ever, to work with.” ShouldWritingFirstsAgeNovelCuttingChildhoodMaterialsTwentiesValuableTeethCraftsFiftySixtyAutobiographyTwenty OneYoungsters Author:Laura Z. Hobson
“The wrongs of childhood and upbringing have made a large and obsessional contribution to autobiography and the novel.” MadeNovelChildhoodContributionAutobiographyUpbringing Author:V. S. Pritchett
“I'm boggled by the idea of being an only child. I know nothing at all (I'm happy to say) about having had a cold and withholding mother, about being divorced. The more I've been writing novels, each novel I've written has become successively less grounded in anything approaching autobiography.” KnowsWritingChildrenIdeasMotherNovelWrittenColdAutobiographyGroundedDivorcedOnly ChildWithholding Author:Anna Quindlen
“In a novel there's not much autobiography. There are characters in transit. Naturally, I can project something of my experiences onto the characters, but they have their own autonomy, a personality that is often a mystery to me.” I CanCharacterNovelMysteryPersonalityProjectsAutobiographyAutonomy Author:Dacia Maraini
“Travel books are all sorts - some are autobiographies, some are about falling in love. Some are about having great meals, some are about suffering. There are as many different kinds of travel books as there are novels. People think a travel book is one thing. It's many things.” PeopleThinkingKindBookDifferentSufferingFallNovelOne ThingFalling In LoveMealsDifferent KindsAutobiographyTravel Books Author:Paul Theroux
“I never thought I would write an autobiography, probably because my first novel, Go Now, is really all drawn from my life, even though it's more about the psychology going on.” WritingFirstsNovelPsychologyAutobiography Author:Richard Hell
“The problem with an autobiography is that all these extra factors make it difficult. You don't want to hurt people's feelings. You don't know how much you can trust your memory. You don't want it to be self-serving. And you have all these issues about how to present yourself. All these factors make it harder to do than a novel.” PeopleKnowsWantSelfFeelingsProblemDifficultHurtMemoriesNovelKnow HowIssuesHarderFactorsExtrasServingAutobiographyOur MemoriesSelf Serving Author:Richard Hell
“Every novel is a biography. Well, then, this is a novel [The Paper Men] which is a biography that is pretending to be an autobiography. That's what you could say about it.” MenWellsNovelPaperPretendingAutobiographyBiographies Author:William Golding