Richard Russo Quotes & Sayings (Page 3)

“Writers are people who put pen to paper every day.”

“You use simple brushstrokes in a screenplay for things over which you would take much greater pains in a novel.”

“Cary Grant never won an Oscar, primarily, I suspect, because he made everything look so effortless. Why reward someone for having fun, for being charming?”

“The deepest failures any fiction writer is likely to have are failures of not quite comprehending the truth of the story that he or she is telling.”

“Ultimately, your theme will find you. You don't have to go looking for it.”

“A lot of my characters in all of my books have a self-destructive urge. They'll do precisely the thing that they know is wrong, take a perverse delight in doing the wrong thing.”

“When I start getting close to the end of a novel, something registers in the back of my mind for the next novel, so that I usually don't write, or take notes. And I certainly don't begin. I just allow things to percolate for a while.”

“About 15 years ago I went though a period of a year or so when I just couldn't find anything good. My wife noticed I was having trouble reading menus. I bought some cheap reading glasses in a drug store. I got home and suddenly all these books that weren't good were good.”

“You can be interested in a Jane Smiley novel whether or not anyone says a word. She enters into her characters' thoughts with great understanding and depth.”

“A short story is something that I think can be intuited and envisioned and held in your mind almost at once.”