“I try to write things that can't be made into movies. My novels have thwarted many attempts to film them and I think that was true of the essay, too. If you'd actually tried to be true to the essay, it would have been, perhaps, boring. So taking that narrow little cast of characters and expanding it out, that was what was exciting about the project for me.” IfsThinkingWritingTryingLittlesHas BeensMadeCharacterFilmNovelProjectsExcitingCastsBoringBeing TrueEssaysExpanding Author:Jonathan Franzen
“Working on an essay versus a novel is like the difference between seeing to that curtain and seeing to New Jersey.” DifferencesNovelSeeingVersusEssaysCurtainsJerseyNew Jersey Author:Sloane Crosley
“The reason I shift gears constantly, why I'm doing an opera, why I've done essays, why I've written poetry for years that nobody wanted, why I do short stories and novels and screenplays... is so I will have new ways of failing. This means becoming a student again.” WayYearsMeanReasonDoneStoriesWantedNovelFailingWrittenStudentsBecomingShort StoryOperaNew WaysEssaysGearsScreenplays Author:Ray Bradbury
“There are some short essays that are very grave, and most contemporary novels are lighter than air.” NovelAirGravesContemporaryEssaysLighters Author:Fran Lebowitz
“Between Malraux, Balzac, and Montaigne, I choose Montaigne. Montaigne will survive all the others, because the essay, meaning direct communication between the writer and his reader, will outlast the novel, by at least a thousand years.” YearsNovelCommunicationReaderThousandDirectThousand YearsEssaysBalzacDirect Communication Author:Gore Vidal
“Invisible Beasts is a strange and beautiful meditation on love and seeing, a hybrid of fantasy and field guide, novel and essay, treatise and fable. With one hand it offers a sad commentary on environmental degradation, while with the other it presents a bright, whimsical, and funny exploration of what it means to be human. It's wonderfully written, crazily imagined, and absolutely original.” HumansMeanHandsBeautifulFantasyNovelMeditationWrittenSeeingFieldsStrangeOffersOriginalsEnvironmentalGuidesInvisibleBeastExplorationEssaysDegradationCommentaryFablesHybridWhimsicalEnvironmental DegradationWhat It Means To Be Human Author:Anthony Doerr
“The aim of poetry, it appears, is to fill the mind with lofty thoughts--not to give it joy, but to give it a grand and somewhat gaudy sense of virtue. The essay is a weapon against the degenerate tendencies of the age. The novel, properly conceived, is a means of uplifting the spirit; its aim is to inspire, not merely to satisfy the low curiosity of man in man.” MenGivingMindMeanAgeJoySpiritLiteratureNovelVirtueInspireWeaponsLowsAimCuriosityTendenciesUpliftingEssaysLoftyDegeneratesAmerican LiteratureGaudy Book:H.L. Mencken: Prejudices: First, Second, and Third Series Source: H.L. Mencken: Prejudices: First, Second, and Third Series
“I'm a privileged person, I feel privileged because of who I am. I write books, I write novels, I write essays and I teach and I go from university to university. I'm one of the old, but I still go around, but I only see those who are not like that, I don't see the junk youth. I only meet students, and even those who are not formally at the university, if they come to listen to me, they come to read me, it means they are not junk students.” IfsFeelsWritingMeanPersonsStillsBookTeachNovelYouthStudentsUniversityWho I AmPrivilegedEssaysJunkListen To Me Author:Elie Wiesel
“Writing has to do with truth-telling. When you're writing, let's say, an essay for a magazine, you try to tell the truth at every moment. You do your best to quote people accurately and get everything right. Writing a novel is a break from that: freedom. When you're writing a novel, you are in charge; you can beef things up.” PeopleWritingTryingMomentsBreakNovelMagazinesTelling The TruthEssaysBeef Author:Nicholson Baker
“If any art form can accommodate contemporary culture, it's the novel. It's so malleable - it can incorporate essays, poetry, film. Maybe the challenge for the novelist is to stretch his art and his language, to the point where it can finally describe what's happening around him.” IfsArtFilmFormCultureLanguageChallengesNovelHappeningsContemporaryNovelistsEssaysAccommodate Author:Don DeLillo
“Like when you pick up a book and you don't realize what type of text it is - it could be an essay, a novel, a biography - and at one point you realize you don't know where, as a reader, you want to be. Where are you going with this text? What is the goal? How are you supposed to interpret what you're reading? And people's responses vary - some dislike it, and are put off by the confusion, the lack of comprehension.” PeopleKnowsWantBookReadingGoalRealizingNovelTypeReaderPicksResponseConfusionDislikeBiographiesEssaysVaryComprehension Author:Sergio Chejfec
“The ingredients that make a good poem often differ from those that make a good essay and from those that make a good novel.” NovelIngredientsEssays Author:Kathleen Rooney
“Maybe someone's who's a different kind of writer [would think otherwise] - someone who'd be just as comfortable writing essays on what their novels are about. Sometimes you feel like certain novelists are like that.” ThinkingFeelsWritingKindDifferentSometimesCertainNovelComfortableNovelistsDifferent KindsEssaysWriting Essays Author:Chang-Rae Lee
“I was born in the era of the novel. I've written many, as well as collections of poetry, and essays for mouthing off. I've written to inches, word-counts, page-counts, even the sonnet and the screenplay (which I call a plot poem). I write narrative. That's it. I just want to tell it.” WantWritingWellsBornNovelWrittenPagesErasNarrativeCollectionsPlotInchesEssaysSonnetScreenplays Author:Julianna Baggott