“It has long been a tradition among novel writers that a book must end by everybody getting just what they wanted, or if the conventional happy ending was impossible, then it must be a tragedy in which one or both should die. In real life very few of us get what we want, our tragedies don't kill us, but we go on living them year after year, carrying them with us like a scar on an old wound.” IfsWantShouldWritingYearsLongBookRealEndsWantedDiesNovelImpossibleGoes OnTraditionTragedyWoundsReal LifeScarConventionalHappy EndingsOld Wounds Author:Willa Cather
“The possibility of the impossible, dreams and illusions, are the subject of my novels.” DreamNovelImpossibleSubjectsPossibilityIllusionImpossible Dream Author:Jose Saramago
“What is a novel? I say: an invented story. At the same time a story which, though invented has the power to ring true. True to what? True to life as the reader knows life to be or, it may be, feels life to be. And I mean the adult, the grown-up reader. Such a reader has outgrown fairy tales, and we do not want the fantastic and the impossible. So I say to you that a novel must stand up to the adult tests of reality.” KnowsWantFeelsMayMeanStoriesRealityTruthFictionNovelImpossibleReaderAdultsTestsRingsTalesFantasticFairyFairy TaleRealismTrue Life Author:Elizabeth Bowen
“I have this very moment finished reading a novel called The Vicar of Wakefield [by Oliver Goldsmith].... It appears to me, to be impossible any person could read this book through with a dry eye and yet, I don't much like it.... There is but very little story, the plot is thin, the incidents very rare, the sentiments uncommon, the vicar is contented, humble, pious, virtuous--but upon the whole the book has not at all satisfied my expectations.” LittlesPersonsBookWholeMomentsStoriesEyeReadingNovelImpossibleExpectationsHumbleFinishedSatisfiedDryPlotSentimentsVirtuousIncidentsPiousUncommonVicars Author:Fanny Burney
“A disturbing novel about dreams and wishes, a nightmarish distaff monkey's paw of a book that it's impossible to forget. Lisa Tuttle remains our preeminent chronicler of family madness and desire.” BookDreamDesireWishForgetNovelImpossibleMadnessRemainsMonkeysDisturbingPawsImpossible To Forget Author:Neil Gaiman
“I do write a lot of prose. It's not disciplined enough yet that it's actually become stories, or short stories. The idea of writing a novel seems impossible.” WritingIdeasEnoughStoriesSeemsNovelImpossibleProseShort Story Author:PJ Harvey
“Stuart Rojstaczer writes with enormous wit, style and empathy, and The Mathematician's Shiva is a big-hearted, rollickingly funny novel that's impossible to put down. A tremendous debut.” WritingBigsNovelImpossibleStyleEmpathyWitEnormousMathematicianHeartedDebutShiva Author:Molly Antopol
“You, and in fact quite a lot of your generation, have in some way been exiled from that particular sanctuary. It's become almost impossible for someone to "go mad" in the classical sense. At one time people conveniently "went mad" and were never heard from again. Like a character in a romantic novel. But now you are too hip to yourself on a psychological level. You all are too intimate with too many of the symptoms of insanity to be caught completely off your guard.” PeopleWayCharacterFactsLevelsNovelImpossibleGenerationsHeardParticularMadCaughtPsychologicalHipsInsanityIntimateOne TimeSymptomsSanctuary Author:Ken Kesey
“Writing a novel- actually picking the words and filling in paragraphs- is a tremendous pain in the ass. Now that TV's so good and the Internet is an endless forest of distraction, it's damn near impossible. That should be taken into account when ranking the all-time greats. Somebody like Charles Dickens, for example, who had nothing better to do except eat mutton and attend public hangings, should get very little credit.” ShouldWritingLittlesPainNovelTakenImpossibleExampleTvsInternetAccountsCreditEndlessForestsAssAll TimeDamnDistractionFillingParagraphDickensRankingFilling InMutton Author:Steve Hely
“Characters to me are like sonnets, they have limits that you obey which allow a force to enter in, an invention that makes the novel possible. Change the limits and the force leaves. The novel becomes impossible.” CharacterForceNovelImpossibleLimitsInventionSonnetPossible Change Author:Alexander Chee