David Mitchell Quotes
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Every relationship has its own language. It takes a long time to evolve and read one another. Just as it's true for people, it's also true on a national or cultural level.
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The art of the novelist is not unrelated to the illness of multiple personality disorder. It's a much milder form. But the better the book, the nearer to the padded cell you are.
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Loneliness is an integral part of travelling. I used to think it was the downside to travelling, but now I realise it is a necessary educative part of it to be embraced.
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In the 1970s and 1980s there was so little decent fiction for young people, but we're now in a golden age that shows no sign of fading. Philip Pullman, J. K. Rowling, Lemony Snicket are only three of the best known among a good number of equals.
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People like to say that East Asians in general, and Japanese in particular, are not very expressive: there's that term 'inscrutable.' But often, Europeans just don't get the Asian codes. Believe me, the message is being expressed OK.
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I think all writers of my age who are brought up on films probably by the age of 16 have seen many more films than they have read classics of literature. We can't help but be influenced by film. Film has got some great tricks that it's taught writers.
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When I think about it, I'm happily bewildered that people will preorder my books They'll preorder me. What a lucky guy!
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Any adaptation is a translation, and there is such a thing as an unreadably faithful translation; and I believe a degree of reinterpretation for the new language may be not only inevitable but desirable.
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Your environment affects you wherever you are.
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I don't have problems starting writing. I have problems stopping. I'm one of the last dads to arrive at school to collect the kids, because I want to get this paragraph just right.
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I think it's natural for youth to be drawn to newness: The world is still new for them.
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Sometimes, comics will make the observation that it's not jokes that are funny, it's characters that are funny. And isn't that true! That's why I always kill jokes. I'm terrible at them, because I get the joke right, but I can't get the character right, and it just goes down like a lead balloon.
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A novelist needs to know his own strong points and weak points.
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I'm certainly a plot and character man. Themes, structure, style - they're valid components of a novel and you can't complete the book without them. But I think what propels me as a reader is plot and character.
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Historically, unfortunately, race seems to be the major division that humanity has imposed on itself, a way of subdividing into smaller groups.
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I love HBO productions, actually, like 'The Wire.'
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There's a disease that young writers are susceptible to, which is, I will do this because I can - hubris, I suppose - without stopping to work out why.
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I'm not from a milieu where high-register language or philosophical ideas were welcome.
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Write something every single day, even if it's just three lines. And it doesn't matter if it's any good - just write something every day.
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I'm a novelist, that's how I make my livelihood, and I concentrate on the novels.
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I still haven't quite got used to eating live fish.
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I often lose myself in the Sudoku-like challenges of making a book work.
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It's true that stammerers can become more adept at sentence construction.
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My books are anti-absolutist and deeply distrustful of any religious stance that precludes the validity of any other.