Susanna Clarke (Susanna Mary Clarke) Quotes
Quotes to Explore
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The first thing my writing ever earned me wasn't an advance on a book; it wasn't a fee for an article or anything like that. It was, in fact, a residency at Hedgebrook Farm.
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Writing is like a contact sport, like football. You can get hurt, but you enjoy it.
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Nothing endures but personal qualities.
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I read my books to writing workshops and friends, and I'm often focussed just on keeping them entertained. I never think about marketing at all.
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All writing is that structure of revelation. There's something you want to find out. If you know everything up front in the beginning, you really don't need to read further if there's nothing else to find out.
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Every story I create, creates me. I write to create myself.
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I was very, very little - it was the first time I ever cooked on my own, with my mother's supervision - and I made scrambled eggs. I felt so accomplished, like magic!
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I love writing. Given a choice, after directing for all these years, and if given an army of talented directors, I would not direct at all.
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Arendt did have a certain snobbishness, though in some of her writing she expressed more democratic attitudes.
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I spent a lot of time doing really unimportant work as an actor. It was important when I started writing that I obviously make it entertaining, or no one is going to go see it - but to really make you think, that is my goal.
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I think making the referee aware of a situation, there is nothing wrong with that.
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But in the meantime I became accustomed to the writing life and it would be hard to change now - partly because of the salary cut if I went to my other love, teaching; and partly because I still have stories to tell, even though it isn't all that fun doing the work anymore.
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If I let myself go, nothing will get done.
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Storytelling is storytelling. Good stories need compelling characters and interesting conflicts. That's the bottom line no matter what medium you're writing for.
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The Scottish Highlands are incredible. There seems to be magic and poetry everywhere.
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I think the beauty of the writing of 'Game of Thrones' is not that the characters are fearless; it's how they overcome their fear, you know?
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A lot of the songs on '2' are pretty personal, but even if I'm writing about something like that, I still tend to keep it pretty simple and open-ended. I like the idea of people listening to my album and it meaning something to me but maybe meaning something else to them.
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Local markets for literary fiction remain underdeveloped; the metropolis often holds out the only real possibility of a professional writing career.
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I've made a professional reputation playing working-class, middle-class, American women. There's a real sense of stoicism and pragmatism and strength and lyricism of a woman like that.
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But the whole point of liberation is that you get out. Restructure your life. Act by yourself.
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A subject which at first glance seems quite removed from the undeclared concern of the book can encapsulate that concern.
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Parenting is the hardest thing I have ever done. I tried to find the balance between the strict, traditional Chinese way I was raised, which I think can be too harsh, and what I see as a tendency in the West to be too permissive and indulgent. If I could do it all again, I would, with some adjustments.
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Because I'm Irish, I've always done an accent. Not doing an accent is off-putting because I sound like me. I love doing an accent. Doing the accent from West Virginia was great, and we had to get specific with it.
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A piece of writing is like a piece of magic. You create something out of nothing.
