Sigrid Nunez Quotes
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There's a lot of material from my life in my books, but they're not really autobiographical, in the sense that they're not about my life. So, in 'A Feather on the Breath of God' I write about my parents, I write about this Russian immigrant, I write about the world of dance, but it isn't an autobiography; so much is left out.
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No one's memory is infallible, of course - quite the opposite.
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You might not remember what you had for dinner last night, but you remember everything about one particular summer of your youth. It's like that.
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Read as much as possible, especially the work of writers who most deeply affect you. Make those writers your family. Never wait for inspiration to strike before getting to work; be disciplined and form the habit of writing every day.
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Working at the 'Review', if anything, the impression you got was, 'I'll never be good enough. I'll never work hard enough. I'll never be devoted enough.' These people are staying up all night over their sentences!
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Unfortunately, I was like a lot of my own students, who don't really want criticism, just encouragement.
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I try to write every day, preferably first thing in the morning. Of course, there are days when something happens to interfere with this ideal schedule. Then I try to find time later in the day. I usually work at home, but sometimes, for a change I'll go to a library or a cafe. And I like to read poetry before I sit down to write.
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You don't sit there at twenty-five, unpublished, inexperienced, and respond to Susan Sontag's editorial suggestions like a little snot, rejecting every one of them. But it had a lot to do with the fact that I didn't admire Susan's own fiction.
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You write a thing down because you're hoping to get a hold on it.
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You write about experiences partly to understand what they mean, partly not to lose them to time. To oblivion. But there's always the danger of the opposite happening. Losing the memory of the experience itself to the memory of writing about it.