I was in L.A. in '08. It was a cold Saturday night. I had spread my phone number out to a score of women and was just indulging this sweet, sad, elegiac, bale loneliness - don't tell me you haven't been there.

James Ellroy

Categorized in : Night Sweet Loneliness

The novel is final form; it's the ultimate individual final form. Television and motion pictures never get there. You'd be fabulous to think that something you write is even going to be filmed. I give it the best shot of which I'm capable. But it's more a payday for me. And if I didn't have alimony and the full-time assistant.

writing giving thinking

It's all sex for me. Politics is sex. Race is sex. It's the novel... by James Ellroy

It's all sex for me. Politics is sex. Race is sex. It's the novel. It's the novel!

novel race sex

We do. Or re-create the ones we have, and project. My whole life... by James Ellroy

We do. Or re-create the ones we have, and project. My whole life is projection.

whole-life projects life-is

History is a state of yearning. I yearn for Kay Lake throughout this entire thing. There's an essay I've written where I talked about living in the past. There's a whole motif in the book of then and now. And I lived there.

lakes book past

And you love to read, you love to escape, right? by James Ellroy

And you love to read, you love to escape, right?

love-to-read

I like to have fun out there. I work hard, and then I get to cut loose and go out and tour, and I enjoy it. I like to go out and meet the people. I love to sell books.

hard-work fun book

I wanted things. Whatever it cost and whatever it took, I would d... by James Ellroy

I wanted things. Whatever it cost and whatever it took, I would do it. And that's it.

cost wanted

[Raymond] Chandler, I reread him, and there's a lot of bad writing there. I don't think he knew much about people.

writing people thinking

How did I change my life? I wanted things. I wanted women and I w... by James Ellroy

How did I change my life? I wanted things. I wanted women and I wanted to write books.

changing-my-life writing book

The 250-page outline for American Tabloid. The books are so dense. They're so complex, you cannot write like I write off the top of your head. It's the combination of that meticulousness and the power of the prose and, I think, the depth of the characterizations and the risks that I've taken with language that give the books their clout. And that's where I get pissed off at a lot of my younger readers.

taken writing book

I'm not interested in popular culture. I hate Quentin Tarantino. I rarely go to movies. I hate rock 'n' roll. I work. I think. I listen to classical music. I brood. I like sports cars.

hate sports thinking

I think the great unspoken theme in noir fiction is male self-pit... by James Ellroy

I think the great unspoken theme in noir fiction is male self-pity. It pervades noir movies.

males self thinking

My guys are morally weak, and they reach toward a tenuous knowledge of self-sacrifice, and sometimes it's too late. I find that moving. It's not a life I'd want to live. But, then, I'm not completely my books.

sacrifice book moving

Joe Wambaugh's a friend. I know him only casually, but I like him... by James Ellroy

Joe Wambaugh's a friend. I know him only casually, but I like him a lot. I think he likes my books.

likes book thinking

You try to learn who you are. You work hard. You've either got it or you don't when it comes to writing books. And you tend to only get these things if you want them, and want them to the exclusion of everything else.

hard-work writing book

I almost had an intransigent mental spirit. I always wanted thing... by James Ellroy

I almost had an intransigent mental spirit. I always wanted things.

spirit wanted

For a much lauded writer, I'm not terribly self-absorbed. In social situations, which are difficult for me - I mean, this is an interview - I'm normally uncomfortable talking about myself.

self talking mean

I'm grateful for the life I have. I lived bad for many years, and I've got a great life now. I've got the kind of life people only dream about.

grateful dream years

There are a lot of Ellroy lifts, man. This guy went to school. But then there's a willful thing that comes over me - God gives it to me - where I go, "That's real nice, let's just go home, pat yourself on the back, good dog, good dog, and wake up in the morning and go to work."

real dog morning

My father actually went to college, and my mother went to nursing school, so, you know. I wouldn't... They were actually too square and right-wing to be hip, too well-educated to be white trash, too sexy to be square. They really didn't fit any mold. They weren't really hipsters. They were just - they were two of a kind, those two.

sexy mother father