I'm not much crazier than anybody else, but I'm not much saner. Robert Stone More Quotes by Robert Stone More Quotes From Robert Stone What you're trying to do when you write is to crowd the reader out of his own space and occupy it with yours, in a good cause. You're trying to take over his sensibility and deliver an experience that moves from mere information. Robert Stone space writing moving That's the great thing about literature -- it makes the world less lonely. Robert Stone lonely literature world When rewriting, move quickly. It's a little like cutting your own hair. Robert Stone cutting writing moving The reason I was able to give up smoking was because of the computer. You couldn't lean a cigarette on a computer, like you could on a typewriter. So it just made it that much more difficult to smoke. So I quit. Robert Stone giving-up typewriters smoking You don't want to depend on an editor. If you want to regret something for the rest of your life, you want to make sure you're responsible for it. Robert Stone editors regret want I write a very rough first draft of every chapter, then I rewrite every chapter. I try to get it down in the first rewrite, but some chapters I can't get quite right the third time. There are some I go over and over and over again. Robert Stone writing trying firsts Life is a means of extracting fiction. Robert Stone life mean fiction Everybody's after a new morning. What do we have to run up and salute tomorrow? Robert Stone tomorrow running morning I've always remembered. This fellow said to me - if you think someones'doing you wrong, it's not for you to judge. Kill them first and then God can do the judging. Robert Stone doing-you judging thinking It's all about letting the story take over. Robert Stone stories letting-go I start early in the morning. I'm usually out in the woods with the dog as soon as it gets light; then I drink a whole lot of tea and start as early as I can, and I go as long as I can. Robert Stone light dog morning I really, really wanted to write. I loved language. I loved literature. I loved reading. I never read a foreign language, I'm afraid, but I loved Flaubert. I loved the 19th-century classics. I love Thomas Hardy. I wanted to be a goof on a bus, but I wanted to write more. Robert Stone reading literature writing If you couldn't tell the difference between what hurt and what didn't, you had no business being alive. You can't have any good times if you can't tell. Robert Stone differences alive hurt If you haven't fought for your life for something you want, you don't know what's life all about. Robert Stone havens knows want One does not consider style, because style is. Robert Stone style doe writing You should let dialogue get as nearly out of control as you can. Characters should say what they say to each other instead of what they mean to say. The worst purpose of dialogue is to elicit information: "You know why we're out on this space station, Carruthers - to save the universe!" Robert Stone space character mean The lessons I learned that were most important were the ones that hurt my feelings. Robert Stone teaching hurt feelings There’s only one subject for fiction or poetry or even a joke: how it is. In all the arts, the payoff is always the same: recognition. If it works, you say that’s real, that’s truth, that’s life, that’s the way things are. ‘There it is.’ Robert Stone real fiction art I was under the influence of the early modern masters, Fitzgerald and Steinbeck and Hemingway, especially, when I was a kid. I reacted against writers like Barth and John Hawkes. I did not care for the post-modernist stuff; my allegiance was to realism. Robert Stone care stuff kids The process of creating is related to the process of dreaming although when you are writing you're doing it and when you're dreaming, it's doing you. Robert Stone creating dream writing
