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Reader Quotes

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Reader Quotes

“[Michael] Chabon is arguing in favor of what is at the same time an old-fashioned and very forward-thinking opening up - of taking off the class associations with those labels, because we grew up, or I certainly grew up, feeling that, "Oh, there's literary fiction, and beneath that, there's these other things." He's actually saying that they're all of equal merit, and in many cases, that work in the genres, or work that draws from the genres is more entertaining for readers, since it is our job to entertain people.”

“I think about the collaboration between writers and readers, but I also think about the collaboration between all the writers in a generation or in a country or across time contributing to this massive project of documenting and reimagining our world.”

Thinking World Country Generations Reader Projects Massive Our World Collaboration Contributing Reimagining

Author:Emily Barton

“Because I think of novels as collaborative enterprises between the writer and the reader, all of my novels so far have ending with endings that maybe point in more than one direction, and that seems important to me because it seems important to me that after you've invested twenty or thirty hours of your imaginative life into this narrative that you have some stake in how it ends.”

Thinking Important Ends Seems Hours Novel Reader Twenties Narrative Thirty Enterprise Stakes Imaginative One Direction

Author:Emily Barton

“I do think they [French] view my writing itself as exotic - though that's probably not the best term for it - to a small extent, mainly because I say things that most French writers would probably hesitate to say for fear of offending someone or upsetting public sensibilities. I don't think that answers the question, but I'm not much good at figuring readers out or I would probably be writing bestsellers.”

Thinking Writing Term Answers Views Reader Upset Sensibility Exotic Offending

Author:Donald Ray Pollock

“I think of Mercy Watson like a superball; there's a bouncy kind of optimism to her stories. She allows me to play, and she makes me laugh. Hopefully readers feel the same way.”

Thinking Way Feels Kind Play Stories Laughing Reader Optimism Mercy Hopefully Think Of Me Watson Make Me Laugh

Author:Kate DiCamillo

“There are a lot of words that I knew first as a reader, and I never put the pieces together in my brain. The word segue I thought was pronounced "seeg," I think until I went to college, which is horribly embarrassing.”

Thinking Firsts Together Brain Pieces College Reader Embarrassing

Author:Zoe Kazan

“Sometimes I feel too transparent in my poetry, but that's what I think the beauty of poetry is, because as transparent as the author can be, it's usually only a reflection of what the reader can interpret, and based on their own personal experiences.”

Thinking Feels Sometimes Reader Reflection Poetry Is Transparent Personal Experiences

Author:Masiela Lusha

“Then basically what was happening was that it was the middle '80s, and Rolling Stone realized that a lot of their readers had voted for [Ronald] Reagan, and they were going, "Gosh! We need a Republican! Does anybody know a Republican? Wait a minute! I think P.J.'s a Republican!"”

Thinking Knows Needs Doe Waiting Middle Minutes Reader Republican Happenings Stones Rolling 80s Rolling Stones

Author:P. J. O'Rourke

“The expansion I have in mind isn't the same as distortion. Of course, there are those who say their views represent Reformed thought, but what they end up with is a caricature of what Reformed thinking is really about. I hope I am not one of those people, but readers [of the Saving Calvinism] will have to make up their own minds on that score!”

People Thinking Mind Ends Courses Views Reader Saving Score Expansion Distortion Caricatures Calvinism

Author:Oliver D. Crisp

“I didn't want to give the white reader an opportunity to think of racism as imaginary - a sentiment that is already a central barrier in addressing the problem.”

Thinking Want Giving Problem Opportunity White Reader Racism Barriers Sentiments Imaginary

Author:Vivek Shraya

“The biggest challenge I think every publisher is facing is how do we get readers to pay for content? So we're constantly testing, trying new things.”

Thinking Trying Challenges Pay Reader New Things Publishers Testing Trying New Things

Author:Maria Rodale

“Ultimately, I think that the growth and sustainability of the e-book movement depends on authors and end-users (readers).”

Thinking Book Ends Growth Movement Depends Reader Sustainability Users

Author:Tom Peters

“As a reader, I do not like to have everything handed to me. Because after a while it gets formulaic and I'm thinking, "If this is so thought through, then why do I need to read it. It's done!" It becomes a beach book at a certain point.”

Ifs Thinking Needs Book Done Certain Reader Beach

Author:John Edgar Wideman

“When I'm writing, I'm thinking, "Well, this might be a book that I'll always be happy with, and certainly readers will be happy with." But another part of me knows that when I'm past the stage of writing, the book is gonna have good things about it, bad things about it - probably more bad than good. I just know that. That's who I am.”

Thinking Knows Writing Wells Book Might Past Stage Reader Good Things Who I Am Bad Things Always Be Happy

Author:John Edgar Wideman

“I wasn't a big comic book reader. I always had trouble knowing which box to read next. I was always reading from the wrong box. I was like, this is a comic book that doesn't make any sense! I think I was reading them all out of sequence.”

Thinking Book Bigs Reading Next Knowing Trouble Reader Boxes Comic Comic Book Sequence Book Readers

Author:Tim Burton

“I always think about myself as a writer; that comes out of being a reader first, and I don't think I kind of got to really playing with language in any formal way probably until I was in my mid-twenties.”

Thinking Way Firsts Kind Language Reader Twenties Formal

Author:Junot Diaz

“I knew where the magnets were, behind the gyprock, and the magnets were very powerful. I think they had to be powerful for me, otherwise the reader wouldn't have a reciprocal experience. But I was very careful to bury them deeply, deeply in the plaster and paint over them. I didn't want anybody to directly access them, and that's gradually changed for me.”

Thinking Want Powerful Behinds Changed Reader Paint Careful Access Very Powerful Magnet Reciprocal Plasters

Author:William Gibson

“I think [testing] has had a profoundly problematic impact on student learning. It must seem to students that their worth as individuals is equivalent to their test score. The stress the high stakes culture has on teachers is also highly negative and must surely impact students in a negative way. It also de-professionalizes teachers because it encourages them to be script readers, followers of rigid schedules, and to disregard the needs of the people they teach in favor of the scripts and schedules.”

“I believe that any attempt on the part of a libertarian communist society to abridge the rights of a community - for example, to operate on the basis of a market economy of the kind that you describe - would be unforgivable, and I would oppose the practices of such a society as militantly as I think any reader of your publication would.”

Thinking Believe Kind Would Be I Believe Community Practice Economy Rights Example Reader Bases Libertarian Communist Publication Market Economy Unforgivable

Author:Murray Bookchin

“I knew I had found my life's passion after writing my first column for The Washington Post. The response was like nothing we had seen in the business section. Everyday people were writing that finally someone was speaking to them in a way that was understandable. I think we were all shocked at how many readers wrote in to say that they too had a Big Mama who taught them about money.”

People Thinking Way Writing Firsts Bigs Passion Found Taught Reader Response Everyday Posts Sections Shocked Mama Columns Big Mama

Author:Michelle Singletary

“It's an important moment as a reader, I think, when you can forget the question of whether you need to know what happened. Some people really want hard explanations. I'm the other way. I like mysteries. I don't want to frustrate people. I don't want people to feel like they got no answers, but I want to approach the mystery and sit with it.”

People Thinking Knows Way Want Needs Feels Important Hard Moments Answers Forget Happened Mystery Reader Approach Explanation Important Moments

Author:John Darnielle

“People will say you should quit running if you're a slow runner. Or you should quit basketball if you can't dribble with your left hand. I don't agree with that. If you're not a very good reader at 14, nobody thinks you should stop reading.”

People Ifs Thinking Should Hands Running Reading Left Reader Basketball Agree Very Good Quitting Runners Left Hand Dribble

Author:Timothy Shriver

“That's one of the reasons I take a lot of consolation in fiction. You have years to work on it. I think that allows you to reach for the best part of your reader instead of a lot of the internet stuff, in which you're kind of reaching for the worst or the most shallow part of your reader.”

Thinking Years Kind Reason Stuff Fiction Worst Reader Internet Reaching Shallow Consolation

Author:George Saunders

“When you talk about a reader being emotionally moved, a feeling of empathy, I think that comes out of that line-by-line respect for reader. That's actually where it all comes from.”

Thinking Feelings Lines Reader Empathy Moved

Author:George Saunders

“There are an awful lot of readers who won't pick up a book if they think it's got anything horrific in it, or paranormal or whatever.”

Ifs Thinking Book Reader Picks Awful Paranormal Horrific

Author:Peter James

“With a novel, you have the reader with you a lot longer, and you owe him a lot more. Obviously you have to have a plot - I say "obviously," although I think a lot of fiction doesn't, and nothing seems to happen. But to me, there should be something that happens, and it should be at least vaguely plausible. And because the readers are going to be with these characters for a long time, you have to get to know them and like them and want to know what happens to them.”

Thinking Knows Want Should Long Character Seems Happens Fiction Novel Reader Long Time Plot Plausible

Author:Dave Barry

“I think any comic book - or really, any book that you can read - in a sense is an educational tool in that it helps literacy. The more you read, the better you get at it. It almost doesn't matter what you read, the important thing is for young people to become readers.”

People Thinking Important Book Matter Helping Young Reader Tools Important Things Educational Comic Comic Book Literacy

Author:Stan Lee

“I think fiction allows you to inhabit new domains and it's you, the reader living in that domain for a few days that results in a deeper understanding as opposed to the novel proclaiming this is what it is right and this is what is wrong.”

Thinking Understanding Results Fiction Novel Reader Deeper Domain Proclaiming Deeper Understanding

Author:Mohsin Hamid

“It might be helping to explore a story visually by going to see a museum exhibit that's relevant to something that somebody's reading, or going to see a show or listening to a piece of music or cooking a meal that's in one of the stories, something practical, something kinesthetic that draws the reader in and helps them to experience the story for themselves. Those are all ways I think we can kind of come in the back door and help kids find the joy, as opposed to the chore or responsibility, of reading.”

Thinking Way Kind Helping Stories Shows Might Kids Joy Reading Responsibility Pieces Doors Listening Reader Draws Cooking Practicals Meals Museums Relevant Exhibits Chores Back Doors

Author:Emma Walton Hamilton

“When I write, I never think of segments as chapters; I think of them as scenes. I always visualize them in my mind. Then I try to get the scene down on paper as closely as I can. That's the one thing that readers don't see - what you have in your mind. The reader can only see what you get on the page.”

Thinking Writing Trying Mind I Can One Thing Reader Scene Paper Pages Chapters

Author:Robert Cormier

“I think that actually the rhythmic nature of picture books and of young reader story books is a way to help kids fall in love with language and what you can do with it and how it sounds in your range. It sort of has a musicality but on the other hand they get the story and the ideas and the context of it. I think it's a way to get kids into it and I also think that when kids are around people who love books it rubs off on them.”

People Thinking Way Book Ideas Helping Stories Hands Kids Young Fall Language Sound Can Do Reader Falling In Love Range Picture Books Musicality Story Book

Author:Josh Prince

“I don't consciously try to take my readers on a journey as I don't really think about my readers when I'm writing. I just try to write what I feel passionately about, to tell a story down onto the page.”

Thinking Feels Writing Trying Stories Journey Reader Pages

Author:Michael Morpurgo

“I hear from readers a good deal, and I try to answer every letter. I think, because of my commitment to issues of conservation and good agriculture and peaceableness, they find something hopeful in my work.”

Thinking Trying Answers Deals Issues Reader Commitment Letters Hopeful Agriculture Conservation

Author:Wendell Berry

“I'd like to think that what my style of writing is, is an attempt not so much to judge the characters that I'm writing about, to expose them, to label them, to stereotype them, but instead to make them come alive for the reader with all their strengths and their flaws intact.”

Thinking Writing Character Alive Style Judging Reader Labels Flaws Stereotype

Author:Doris Kearns Goodwin

“I want to make sense of things, to understand the world, but my work is never really instructional. I have no wisdom to impart or give, so I think my dream readers would be people who just use the book as an excuse to get into their own cycle of thoughts. The book is just like a map. It's just a jotting-down of things that you can interpret in your own ways.”

People Thinking World Way Want Giving Book Use Dream Would Be Reader Excuse Make Sense Cycles Maps Impart

Author:Sarnath Banerjee

“I feel like the older I get, the truer it feels that I'm only going have an investment in a poem if it allows or forces me to bring something that's supremely me onto the page. I used to think that the speaker of a poem was talking to someone else, to some ideal reader or listener, but now I think that speakers - poets - are talking to themselves. The poem allows you to pose questions that you have you ask of yourself knowing that they are unanswerable.”

Ifs Thinking Feels Used Asks Force Talking Knowing Poet Reader Pages Ideals Investment Speakers Listeners Talking To Someone

Author:Tracy K. Smith

“If I were less lazy, when my play was published, I would go and rewrite everything for the reader. But I don't do that. What people are reading is just me trying to get the actors and directors to do something or think about something.”

People Ifs Thinking Trying Play Reading Actors Reader Directors Lazy

Author:Annie Baker

“I think that Indian writing in English is a really peculiar beast. I can't think of any literature - perhaps Russian literature in the nineteenth century comes close - so exclusively produced by and closely identified with a tiny but powerful ruling elite, the upper-caste, Anglophone upper middle class, and dependent for so long on book buyers and readers elsewhere.”

“I've always liked language and been a big reader. I always loved books as objects. My favorite time of year as a child was September when we'd go buy all kinds of notebooks and pens and markers for school. I think I wanted to be a writer just so I'd be able to fill up all those pages.”

Thinking Years Kind Children Book Bigs Able Wanted School Language Objects Reader Pages My Favorite All Kinds Pens September Notebook Markers

Author:Elaine Equi

“A trouble with poetry is the presence of presumptuousness in poetry, the sense you get in a poem that the poet takes for granted an interest on the reader's part in the poet's autobiographical life, in the poet's memories, problems, difficulties and even minor perceptions. I try to presume that no one is interested in me. And I think experience bears that out. No one's interested in the experiences of a stranger - let's put it that way. And then you have difficulty combined with presumptuousness, which is the most dire trouble with poetry.”

Thinking Way Trying Problem Interest Memories Trouble Poet Bears Reader Perception Difficulty Stranger Granted Poetry Is Minors

Author:Billy Collins

“The thing with Superman is that he's completely emotionally open to the reader. Meaning what he tells you is what he's feeling; there's a transparency there. And what he tells other characters is usually as transparent as can be. What he says he believes in. So there's an honesty that is both really inspiring writing the character. One thing I love about Clark Kent is that there is a badassery that you don't see a lot. Even as Superman, he's always kind of restraining himself. When you challenge him, I think there's nobody that has a stronger spine than Superman.”

“I'm still not a great reader, but my wife is and my daughters are, and I envy them. I think I got into a bad habit of trying to do something all the time, instead of trying to sit down and take my time a little bit.”

Thinking Trying Littles Stills Mother Bits Sports Wife Reader Habit Little Bit Daughter Down And My Wife Envy My Time My Daughter Bad Habits

Author:Mike Krzyzewski

“Reading furnishes the mind only with materials of knowledge; it is thinking that makes what we read ours.”

Source: The Works of John Locke: Essay concerning human understanding (concluded) Defence of Mr. Locke's opinion concerning personal identity. Of the conduct of the understanding. Some thoughts concerning reading and study for a gentlemen. Elements of natural philosophy. New method of a common-place-book

“I think the 'New York Times' reviews overall tend to overlook popular fiction, whether you're a man, woman, white, black, purple or pink. I think there are a lot of readers who would like to see reviews that belong in the range of commercial fiction rather than making the blanket assumption that all commercial fiction is unworthy.”

Thinking Men Black White Fiction New York Reader Range Reviews Purple Men Women New York Times

Author:Jodi Picoult

“I can't promise that every child with learning differences will become a novelist, but I do think all children can become lifelong readers.”

Thinking Children I Can Differences Reader Promise Novelists Lifelong

Author:Rick Riordan

“I think anytime you're writing to the middle grades, you're writing to young readers who are trapped in a number of ways between two worlds: between childhood and adulthood, between their friends and their parents.”

Thinking World Way Writing Two Young Parent Numbers Childhood Middle Reader Grades Trapped Adulthood Two Worlds

Author:Rick Riordan

“A lot of my work comes from what in Asia is called the 'mind of wonder.' There is not a lot of 'mind of wonder' writing in contemporary Western literature. I think that's what appeals to the readers who are my fans.”

Thinking Writing Mind Literature Wonder Fans Reader Western Contemporary Appeals Asia

Author:Tom Robbins

“I think, in a written novel, the way in which you play with the readers' emotion or the way in which you engage the readers' emotions can be very indirect. You could come at it through irony or comedy, etcetera, and you could capture people's sympathies and feelings kind of by stealth if you like.”

People Ifs Thinking Way Kind Play Feelings Emotion Novel Comedy Written Reader Irony Capture Indirect Stealth Etcetera

Author:Salman Rushdie

“Poetry, I think, intensifies the reader's experience. If it's a humorous facet of the story, poetry makes it more exuberant. If it's a sad facet, poetry can make it more poignant.”

Ifs Thinking Stories Reader Humorous Facets Poignant

Author:Vikram Seth

“If there is any secret to my success, I think it's that my characters are very real to me. I feel everything they feel, and therefore I think my readers care about them.”

Ifs Thinking Feels Real Character Care Secret Reader

Author:Sidney Sheldon