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Reading usually precedes writing. And the impulse to write is almost always fired by reading. Reading, the love of reading, is what makes you dream of...more

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A writer, I think, is someone who pays attention to the w

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Love words, agonize over sentences. And pay attention to the world.

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Love words, agonize over sentences. And pay

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A writer, I think, is someone who pays attention to the world.", Frankfurt Book Fair, October 12, 2003]

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My urge to write is an urge not to self-expressionism but to self-transcendence. My work is both bigger and smaller than I am.

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If I thought that what I'm doing when I write is expressing myself, I'd junk the typewriter. Writing is a much more complicated activity that that.

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My idea of a writer: someone interested in everything.

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Writing is a mysterious activity.

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The writer is either a practicing recluse or a delinquent, guilt-ridden one--or both. Usually both.

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To suffer is one thing; another thing is living with the photographed images of suffering, which does not necessarily strengthen conscience and the ab...more

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The photographer is now charging real beasts, beleaguered and too rare to kill. Guns have metamorphosed into cameras in this earnest comedy, the ecolo...more

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A photograph is both a pseudo-presence and a token of absence. Like a wood fire in a room, photographs—especially those of people, of distant landscap...more

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There is nothing wrong with standing back and thinking. To paraphrase several sages: 'Nobody can think and hit someone at the same time.