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That's not writing that's typing.

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Writing stopped being fun when I discovered the difference between good writing and bad and, even more terrifying, the difference between it and true ...more

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What I am trying to achieve is a voice sitting by a fireplace telling you a story on a winter’s evening.

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That isn't writing at all, it's typing.

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I only object when any one particular group...gets a stranglehold on American criticism and squeezes out anybody who doesn't conform to its own standa...more

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It was as if I were an oyster and somebody forced a grain of sand into my shell -- a grain of sand that I didn't know was there and didn't particularl...more

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To me, the greatest pleasure of writing is not what it's about, but the inner music that words make.

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Finishing a book is just like you took a child out in the back yard and shot it.

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I believe more in the scissors than I do in the pencil.

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Writing has laws of perspective, of light and shade just as painting does, or music. If you are born knowing them, fine. If not, learn them. Then rear...more

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If there is no mystery, for the artist, to solve inside of his art, then there's no point in it. . . . for me, every act of art is the act of solving ...more

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You can't blame a writer for what the characters say.

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It's a very excruciating life facing that blank piece of paper every day and having to reach up somewhere into the clouds and bring something down out...more

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To me, the greatest pleasure of writing is not what it's about, but the music the words make.