Raymond Carver Quotes
If we're lucky, writer and reader alike, we'll finish the last line or two of a short story and then just sit for a minute, quietly. Ideally, we'll ponder what we've just written or read; maybe our hearts or intellects will have been moved off the peg just a little from where they were before. Our body temperature will have gone up, or down, by a degree. Then, breathing evenly and steadily once more, we'll collect ourselves, writers and readers alike, get up, "created of warm blood and nerves" as a Chekhov character puts it, and go on to the next thing: Life. Always life.
Quotes to Explore
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It's really about, oh come on, this guy wouldn't say that or he wouldn't do that, you know, it's about the characters, about the story, about the situation.
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A story never looks as good as when the other fellow buys it.
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With Altman, he does discuss everything with you, but then leaves you to it and gives you full rein and lets you improvise and create a character while the camera is rolling.
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I'm trying to learn to smoke, which is rather weird when everyone is trying to stop. I'm not a smoker. But my character only smokes as an affectation.
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Will and intellect are one and the same thing.
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I never want to write a book just to tell a story. There is always something deeper going on.
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The test of character is having the ability to meet challenges.
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When you choose your friends, don't be short-changed by choosing personality over character.
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When I did 'The Social Network', David Fincher told me that I managed to make a thankless character pretty awesome. I thought that was really cool because I think he's really cool.
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It's really a sad story, and I liked that. The songs on this album talk about relationships in every aspect.
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What happens with every role, you have to trick yourself, you have to creatively find ways to explore the mental state of your character.
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In film you can use images exclusively and narrate a whole story very quickly, but you don't always so easily find the form in cinema to dig deeper into human thoughts and emotions. And in a novel you can much more easily express a character's inner thoughts and feelings.
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What drew me to the character is that Roberto Duran is the son of an American soldier - a Marine - stationed in Panama and a humble Panamanian mother, and he was abandoned.
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I always wear the shoes of the character a week before going on set; the idea of just putting on a new pair of shoes on the first day of filming is just horrific.
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I try genuinely, when I'm playing a character, to not judge them and just to inhabit someone as how one sees them. That being said, you also want to make sure that you don't blur the edges of people too much because humans are naughty and complicated beings.
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I like to let the story flesh itself out, and usually, the characters make their own decisions as things get under way. Dialogue especially seems to write itself once I'm familiar with the characters and their backgrounds.
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Everybody has a Bill Murray story. He just punishes people for reasons they can't figure out.
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Only men of character are trusted.
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I go through a whole process with the actors first, building and creating characters, then I encourage them to sort of live in that character when they're in the screen.
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Walt's idea was that - as soon as the people who were dining got through their main course. They were supposed to all be seated, served at the same time, when they got into the dessert.
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I teach at the Stanford Business School, and about half of my students are foreign, many of whom, I hope, will stay and build businesses in U.S. But I must tell you that they also have opportunities to come back to India and start great companies and operations.
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I feel like I am a real artist and I want to be able to feel what I am singing about. So when I sing, 'Leave (Get Out),' I have been through that. I think it is just a new generation, whether people are ready for it or not. Teenagers are dating.
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If we're lucky, writer and reader alike, we'll finish the last line or two of a short story and then just sit for a minute, quietly. Ideally, we'll ponder what we've just written or read; maybe our hearts or intellects will have been moved off the peg just a little from where they were before. Our body temperature will have gone up, or down, by a degree. Then, breathing evenly and steadily once more, we'll collect ourselves, writers and readers alike, get up, "created of warm blood and nerves" as a Chekhov character puts it, and go on to the next thing: Life. Always life.
