Quotessence
Home / Topics / Reader Quotes

Reader Quotes

Browse 3935 quotes about Reader.

Related topics

BookWritingIfsThinkingReadingStoriesPeopleWantWayKnowsWorldCharacterNovelShouldFeelsTryingGivingFirstsMindKindFictionWellsPagesLiteratureMayNeedsWrittenBelieveMeanImportantMightTwoLittlesEndsI CanRealPoetYearsIdeasMadeMenHas BeensHeartLongDoeLooksFactsPersonsCertainDifferentLanguageChildrenArtMatterSeemsUseHumansDoneEnoughFeelingsImaginationInterestWould BeSometimesHardStillsWantedAbleFormHappensLinesMomentsHandsYoungBigsCareHelpingSaidAsksAudiencePleasureSubjectsTurnsSelfCoursesEyeInterestingJobsAgeEnjoyWholeReasonAttentionLibraryKidsOrderMovingThreeTogetherGivenmore

Reader Quotes

“...But I don't think I'm the only person who is tired of books and movies full of paper-doll characters you don't care about, who have no self-respect and no respect for anybody or any institution....And I don't want to sound preachy or Victorian, but I'm tired of amorality in fiction and in real life. Immorality is a fascinating human dilemma that creates suspense for the readers and tension for the characters, but where is the tension in an amoral situation? When people have no personal code, nothing is threatening and nothing is meaningful.”

PeopleThinkingWantWritingHumansPersonsBookRealSelfCharacterCareSoundFictionSituationReaderPaperInstitutionsTiredDon't CareMeaningfulReal LifeSuspenseCodeTensionSelf RespectFascinatingThreateningDollsDilemmaI'm TiredImmoralityVictorianNo RespectBooks And MoviesAmorality
Author:Olive Ann Burns
Create image

“It is a little out of touch to presume that someone wants to follow your every observation and insight over the course of hundreds of pages without any sort of payoff. That's why writing isn't a one-way street. You have to give something back: an interesting plot, a surprise, a laugh, a moment of tenderness, a mystery for the reader to piece together.”

WayWantGivingWritingLittlesMomentsTogetherCoursesInterestingLaughingPiecesMysteryStreetsReaderPagesSurpriseInsightObservationOne WayPlotTendernessPayoff
Author:Christopher Bollen
Create image

“I like to be aware of a book as a piece of writing, and aware of its structure as a product of mind, and yet I want to be able to see the represented world through it. I admire artists who succeed in dividing my attention more or less evenly between the world of their books and the art of their books . . . so that a reader may study the work with pleasure as well as the world that it describes.”

WorldWantWritingMindWellsMayArtBookAbleArtistPleasureAttentionStudyPiecesProductsReaderSucceedStructureAdmireDividing
Author:Annie Dillard
Create image

“I try to keep deep love out of my stories because, once that particular subject comes up, it is almost impossible to talk about anything else. Readers don't want to hear about anything else. They go gaga about love. If a lover in a story wins his true love, that's the end of the tale, even if World War III is about to begin, and the sky is black with flying saucers.”

IfsWorldWantLoveTryingWarEndsStoriesWinningBlackImpossibleSkySubjectsParticularReaderLoversCome UpFlyingTalesWar Of The WorldsWorld War IiWorld War IDeep LoveGagaFlying Saucers
Book:Conversations with Kurt Vonnegut
Create image

“There are all sorts of theories and ideas about what constitutes a good opening line. It's tricky thing, and tough to talk about because I don't think conceptually while I work on a first draft -- I just write. To get scientific about it is a little like trying to catch moonbeams in a jar. But there's one thing I'm sure about. An opening line should invite the reader to begin the story. It should say: Listen. Come in here. You want to know about this.”

ThinkingKnowsWantShouldWritingTryingFirstsLittlesIdeasStoriesLinesOne ThingTheoryReaderToughOpeningInvitesTrickyJarsMoonbeams
Author:Stephen King
Create image

“You asked if I thought my fiction had changed anything in the culture and the answer is no. Sure, there's been some scandal, but people are scandalized all the time; it's a way of life for them. It doesn't mean a thing. If you ask if I want my fiction to change anything in the culture, the answer is still no. What I want is to possess my readers while they are reading my book — if I can, to possess them in ways that other writers don't. Then let them return, just as they were, to a world where everybody else is working to change, persuade, tempt, and control them.”

PeopleIfsWorldWayWantMeanStillsI CanBookCultureReadingAsksAnswersFictionChangedReturnReaderScandal
Book:Conversations with Philip Roth
Create image

“There can be no more thrilling idea of intimacy that connecting with someone through the agency of the written word. Here we meet, on the page, naked and unadorned: shorn of class, race, gender, sexual identity, age and nationality. The reader I seek is a tautology, for he/she is simply exactly the person who wants to read what I have written...”

WantPersonsIdeasAgeRaceClassWrittenIdentityReaderPagesGenderNakedIntimacyAgencyConnectingThrillingNationalityWritten WordTautology
Author:Will Self
Create image

“I don't want to write things that people don't want to read. I would have no pleasure in producing something that sold 600 copies but that was considered very wonderful. I would prefer to sell 20,000 copies because the readers loved it. When I write books I don't actually think about the market in that way. I just tell myself the story. I don't think I'm talking to a 10-year-old boy or a six-year-old girl. I just write on the level the story seems to call for.”

PeopleThinkingWayWantWritingYearsBookStoriesSeemsGirlPleasureLevelsTalkingBoysWonderfulReaderSixSellsCopiesSix Year Olds
Author:Emily Rodda
Create image

“Is not this insanity plea becoming rather common? Is it not so common that the reader confidently expects to see it offered in every criminal case that comes before the courts?... Really, what we want now, is not laws against crime, but a law against insanity.”

WantLawCommonCasesCrimeReaderBecomingCourtCriminalsInsanity
Book:The Complete Works of Mark Twain: All 13 Novels, Short Stories, Poetry and Essays
Create image

“The people who lived behind those clean lace curtains in row after row of identical boxes were newspaper readers, and every word in at any rate my newspaper must be clear and comprehensible to them, must be interesting to them, must encourage them to break away from littleness, stimulate their ambition, help them to want to build a better land.”

PeopleWantHelpingInterestingBehindsBreakClearLandReaderAmbitionCleanRateBoxesNewspapersCurtainsIdenticalLace
Author:Arthur Christiansen
Create image

“You have to seduce the reader, manipulate their mind and heart, listen to the music of language. I sometimes think of prose as music, in terms of its rhythms and dynamics, the way you compress and expand the attention of a reader over a sentence, the way the tempo pushes you towards an image or sensation. We want an intense experience, so that we can forget ourselves when we enter the world of the book. When you are reading, the physical object of the book should disappear from your hands.”

ThinkingWorldWayWantShouldWritingMindHeartBookSometimesHandsReadingLanguageTermForgetAttentionObjectsReaderSentencesDisappearIntenseRhythmProseSensationsHeart And MindManipulateTempoDynamicsSeducing
Author:Carlos Ruiz Zafon
Create image

“As readers, we want not only a strong story, but also characters we can relate to, characters that feel real. We have to find something of ourselves in them. Each character, even those only there to serve the mechanics of the plot, should have a number of layers. The entire world you are stepping into as a reader must feel real. It must have resonance, you must be able to touch the light; smell the smells.”

WorldWantFeelsShouldRealCharacterStoriesLightAbleStrongNumbersReaderShould HaveSmellRelatePlotLayersMechanicResonance
Author:Carlos Ruiz Zafon
Create image

“Comic book readers are just as abandoned by the corporate system as the creators, despite the importance supposedly given their hard-earned dollars. The average comics shop can offer only a tiny fraction of an industrywide selection that is itself extremely limited in scope. And even when readers know exactly what they want, the search can be maddeningly futile.”

KnowsWantBookHardGivenReaderOffersImportanceDollarsAverageCreatorTinyDespiteComicCorporateShopsAbandonedComic BookSelectionScopeFractionsBook Readers
Author:Scott McCloud
Create image

“reading is not a passive act. It's a creative act. It's a relationship between the writer and a person the writer will probably never meet. I think it's very wrong to write in a way that leaves no room for the reader to maneuver. I don't want to get in the way. What I'd really like to do is to perform the Indian Rope Trick - go higher and higher and eventually disappear.”

ThinkingWayWantWritingPersonsReadingRoomsCreativeReaderHigherDisappearTricksIndianPassiveRope
Author:Jeanette Winterson
Create image

“When you write a book, you want to have fidelity to the character. Characters and their emotions guide the structure of the novel. The author is aware that there's a certain amount of information she/he has to provide in order to satisfy the reader, knowing that she/he has set something up that must be paid off, but this payment must be made while maintaining fidelity to the characters.”

WantWritingMadeBookCharacterCertainOrderEmotionNovelKnowingInformationReaderAmountPaidStructureGuidesMaintainingPaymentFidelityPaid Off
Author:David Bezmozgis
Create image

“To what or whom does Lizzie Harris direct the imperative title of her startling first book, Stop Wanting? To the reader, the narrator, to desire itself, or to lack? This is a work of complexly, ambiguously layered narratives and identities. The opening poem asserts I want to say what happened / but am suspicious of stories. These lines become an ars poetica for the whole of this painful and exceptional collection in which the unspeakable is stubbornly confronted by a searing eloquence. This is a commanding debut.”

WantFirstsDoeBookWholeStoriesDesireLinesHappenedIdentityReaderDirectPainfulOpeningNarrativeTitlesCollectionsExceptionalImperativesSuspiciousEloquenceUnspeakableDebutNarrators
Author:Lynn Emanuel
Create image

“The brand is lying about something, or at least misrepresenting it. When I read a bottle of shampoo or moisturizer or other beauty product, I always perceive a dark subtext. The words haunt me. It comes across as humorous to the reader/audience, but in fact the words really do make me a little bit queasy. Nothing is as easy or natural as consumer brands want us to think - no problem is as resolvable. Your hair will fall out, eventually. Yet we do have these brands, and we line our shelves with them. There's an inherent irony.”

ThinkingWantLittlesFactsProblemLyingFallEasyBitsNaturalLinesDarkAudienceProductsHairReaderLittle BitHumorousBrandsConsumersPerceiveIronyBottlesInherentShelvesNo ProblemWant UShampooSubtextBeauty Products
Author:Aaron Belz
Create image

“As far as nonviolence and Spiritual Activism, Marshall Rosenberg is it! Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life, is essential reading for anyone who wants to improve their communication skills. Applying the concepts within the book will help guide the reader towards a more loving, compassionate, and nonviolent way of understanding and functioning with others, and foster more compassion in the world. I highly recommend this book.”

WorldWayWantBookHelpingSpiritualLife IsReadingLanguageUnderstandingCompassionCommunicationReaderSkillsEssentialsConceptsGuidesActivismCommunication SkillsCompassionateNonviolenceNonviolent Communication
Author:Marianne Williamson
Create image