Richard Russo Quotes
When I look back over my novels what I find is that when I think I'm finished with a theme, I'm generally not. And usually themes will recur from novel to novel in odd, new guises.
Quotes to Explore
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I wrote my first novel in eighth grade for a boy named Kenny on whom I had an unrequited crush and who sat behind me in social studies.
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I love bookstores and booksellers. In my novel 'Dirty Martini,' I thanked over 3,000 booksellers by name in the back matter.
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We have finished the job, what shall we do with the tools?
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The novel is a seduction; a reader has to be seduced.
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A man in love is incomplete until he has married. Then he's finished.
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In addition I wanted to write a Southern novel, because I'm a Southerner.
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Writing a first novel was an arduous crash course. I learned so much in the six years it took me to write it, mostly technical things pertaining to craft.
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Maybe some people, when they sit down to write their great novel or make their great record or paint their great painting, they have it all planned out in their head. But for me, it's never worked that way.
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In five years' time I'd like to be a mum. I want to settle down and have a family, definitely sooner rather than later. I'd like to have finished my second album too, maybe even my third. I'd like a sound that sticks around that other people are inspired by and that people know is me.
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The strange thing about writing is that it's so easy to write a novel. It is really easy. But it's getting there to the point where it's easy that's hard. The hard part is to get there.
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When starting to think about any novel, part of the motive is: I'm going to show them, this time.
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Before I studied story, I was trying to write a novel, and it was terrible. It wasn't going anywhere, and I couldn't figure out what I was trying to do. It was really hard; much harder than I thought it was going to be. Now that I've studied story, I think I'd have a different approach and maybe I could actually get it done.
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Things are not as they should be. Because He's not finished yet. They will be. Rest assured.
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I always think first about the nature of the story. When I had the idea for 'The Namesake,' I felt that it had to be a novel - it couldn't work as a story.
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We have finished with this charter that has been with us for too long.
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We read five words on the first page of a really good novel and we begin to forget that we are reading printed words on a page; we begin to see images.
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All my novels are very much directly related to my inner life, even though I'm inventing characters, even though it's fiction, even though it's make-believe, it nevertheless is coming out of the deepest recesses of myself.
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An image often propels the novel, gets it started. For me, it's an image that has a lot of emotion connected to it.
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The people of America care about baseball, not about your squalid little squabbles. Reassume your dignity and remember that you (players during the 1981 strike) are the temporary custodians of an enduring public trust.
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Some people don't feel like they need to give anything back because it's like, "Oh, if you're famous, you can just keep giving, and it doesn't matter." It's not just about money. It's not just about giving people gifts or whatever.
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When I look back over my novels what I find is that when I think I'm finished with a theme, I'm generally not. And usually themes will recur from novel to novel in odd, new guises.
