Jami Attenberg Quotes & Sayings (Page 7)

“When does an object become a symbol? All I know is you cannot force it.”

“When we are young - or even 32 - we often say 'yes' to everything because we're worried that we won't know what we'll like if we don't try it.”

“Why e-mail a full emotional statement when, instead, you can text a totally insignificant and ambiguous half-considered phrase?”

“With apologies to all my past boyfriends, I never loved a man the way I loved my old apartment.”

“Do you often find yourself uttering the phrase, 'I feel like I should go?' You do not need to go. You are busy that night. You are busy every night, forever.”

“I always tell people this when they're looking for an agent - they should love your work. You are entitled to work with someone who believes in you. Why do business with someone who is ambivalent about you and your art?”

“I am not one of those people who string their exes along. Instead, I run and hide: under the covers, behind my computer screen, on opposite coasts of the country.”

“I check my phone first thing when I wake up in the morning. I usually take it up with me to bed so it's on the floor next to the bed, although not actually in bed with me, because I really do not want to be the person who sleeps with their phone.”

“I did get in a few fights in school. Kids threw around anti-Semitic slurs, not knowing necessarily what they meant. It was probably just something they picked up somewhere, as kids do.”

“I didn't go to graduate school, where all the important writers seemed to be getting their start. I didn't pursue getting published in literary magazines. I didn't even send out countless pitch letters and manuscripts to agents.”