30 quotes found
Fiction writer · American
American fiction writer
“It is sort of weird being honored for the worst day of your life.”
“I like to kill my enemies and listen to the lamentations of their women”
“Americans are children who must go somewhere else to grow up, and sometimes die.”
“If you could figure out how to live with family then you'd gone a long way toward finding your peace.”
“As if sorrow is the true reality? Without ever putting his mind to it, he's come to believe that loss is the standard trajectory.”
“You can deny him, he thought, watching his father across the table. You can hate him, love him, pity him, never speak to or look at him in the eye again, never deign even to be in his crabbed and b...”
“So what does it mean for a person to devote himself or herself to, as you put it, literary reading and thinking? I would argue this is a person whos trying to see things for what they are. Whos int...”
“Why?' He kept asking in his sweetly belling voice, its tone as pure as marbles swirled around a crystal pail. Why him wun up the tree? Why him nest up theah? Why him gadder nuts? Why? Why? Why? And...”
“...he wonders by what process virtually any discussion about the war seems to profane these ultimate matters of life and death. As if to talk of such things properly we need a mode of speech near t...”
“Ultimately, culture, secular and otherwise, is a collection of survival strategies. The things that look like decorationpoetry, novels, music, dancingif you strip away all the layers, are mechanism...”
“Much of life, fatherhood included, is the story of knowledge acquired too late: if only Id known then what I know now, how much smarter, abler, stronger, I would have been. But nothing really prepa...”
“It has been a frustrating game thus far and [the natives] blow off steam by spending money. Happily there is retail at every turn so the crow doesnt lack for buying opportunities, and its the same ...”
“America loves to pray, God knows. America prays and prays and prays, it is the land of unchained prayer, and all this ceremonial praying is hard on Billy.”
“No it was my choice. It's what I wanted to do. And I knew they'd probably send me to Iraq. It's not like anybody lied to me."She groans. "Billy, all these mofos ever do is lie. You think if they ha...”
“Billy tries to imagine the vast systems that support these athletes. They are among the best-cared for creatures in the history of the planet, beneficiaries of the best nutrition, the latest techno...”
“[Norm said,] 'To all those who argue this war is a mistake, I'd like to point out that we've removed from power one of history's most ruthless and belligerent tyrants. A man who cold-bloodedly murd...”
“There was no such thing as perfection in this world, only moments of such extreme transparency that you forgot yourself, a holy mercy if there ever was one.”
“Over the years I've come to realize that in a broad sense I'm interested in power and politics. I'm interested in how individuals try to eke out some wiggle room within these large institutions . ....”
“It's an important thing and a necessary thing as a writer to always be reaching outside of yourself. They say write what you know. But what you know is rarely enough. You need to know more. But you...”
“. . . any one episode, or even moment, in a persons life is so complex, with so many layers of past and present, desire and indifference, drift and drive, consciousness and unconsciousness, that la...”
“I practiced law for five years and that gives you insight into a certain mind-set that maybe a lot of writers havent had firsthand access to. Theres an almost casual cruelty, a very low level of ov...”
“At the door to the locker room Dime asks [Ennis] to autograph his ball. Ennis rears back. He's chuckling but his eyes are wary. 'Why you want that? I'm just an old equipment hand, nobody cares abou...”
