As a writer you can and should expect to hear conflicting responses to your story. John Dufresne More Quotes by John Dufresne More Quotes From John Dufresne Pleasure is, after all, a luxury. It's love that's essential. John Dufresne luxurypleasureessentials The regional tags are often pejorative and dismissive. Don't think of place-bound stories, in other words, but of stories with a strong sense of place. John Dufresne strongstoriesthinking We all sleep with the corpses of our dead lovers. John Dufresne corpsesloverssleep Fiction begins with the senses, and the senses go to work in a place. John Dufresne sensesfiction It's easier to write about a place sometimes when you've left it, when you can apply your imagination to your memory and let your emotions guide the writing about a place. John Dufresne imaginationwritingmemories The landscape of childhood shapes us as it shapes the characters in our stories. You never forget the sacred places of your childhood. John Dufresne childhoodstoriescharacter I revise like crazy. I start revising before the pen hits the paper. John Dufresne penscrazypaper I write with a fountain pen. And then revise word by word and line by line so that the first draft of a scene is usually the tenth or so draft. John Dufresne lineswritingfirsts With each draft, the work gets better, and usually that means tighter. It means getting the precise word, not the approximate word. John Dufresne preciseget-bettermean In revision, your imagination becomes deeply engaged with your material. It's when you come to know your characters and begin to perceive their motivations and values. John Dufresne motivationimaginationcharacter Writing a story, you understand, is not done by consensus. But we do learn from each other, and we remind ourselves how important this work we're doing is. John Dufresne importantstorieswriting What you create when you're teaching fiction writing is a kind of literary salon, not a social club or a mutual admiration society, not a debating society, not a repair shop, not a fight club or a soap box. It's a place to have a conversation about a story. John Dufresne fightingteachingwriting I learned to love stories by listening to them. John Dufresne love-storystorieslistening There were the fairy tales my father told to me at bedtime. All the standards. I thought my father invented wolves. John Dufresne bedtimefairy-talefather I sat around the kitchen every Sunday afternoon listening to my mother and aunts talk about the people in the neighborhood. Gossip - I loved it. And that turns out to be the writer's job: to attend to the gossip and spread it as far as you can. John Dufresne sundaymotherjobs At the heart of all good fiction and at the heart of all good gossip is the same thing: trouble. John Dufresne gossipheartfiction If you think about it, fiction is nothing more than gossip about the people you've made up. John Dufresne gossippeoplethinking I had begun what I thought might be a career in social work. I was married and deeply involved in the anti-war movement. I thought I'd go about saving the world one person at a time. I worked with kids, teenagers mostly, in neighborhood centers, on the streets, and eventually in a drop-in center. John Dufresne teenagerwarkids I was always writing. I just didn't know if I was any good. John Dufresne ifsknowswriting Drug programs began to turn their attention and money away from prevention and into maintenance. Methadone was cheaper than social workers, I suppose. John Dufresne maintenancedrugattention
