It's amazing how life conspires to set you up with what you need. Rachel Kushner More Quotes by Rachel Kushner More Quotes From Rachel Kushner I guess I still feel that way and yet I'm slightly hesitant to insist on that idea, that it "better be fun for the writer." Or rather, that if it is, then the pleasure is a sign that it's good. Maybe I feel I've read that somewhere, other writers saying it, and I just think there is possibly no formula, and I don't like to read an interview with a writer where they just lay out the doxa of what quality is. It can seem brittle to do that. Rachel Kushner qualityfunthinking My mother told me many stories about her childhood in Cuba. Living there had a profound impact on her and how she regards herself. Rachel Kushner impactmotherprofound I'm a very interior person. I love silence. I revel in it. I'm happy that way. Rachel Kushner silencepersonsway I have spent a lot of time in the art world, and I guess I do listen to how people speak. I'm interested in what they say and how they say it. Rachel Kushner peopleworldart I'm releasing myself from the responsibility of claiming to know when something is good and when it isn't. Rachel Kushner responsibility I guess I'm not really fond of just chit-chatting. I want to learn something and have an experience. Rachel Kushner chattingwant I begin a book with imagery, more than I do with an idea or a character. Some kind of poetic image. Rachel Kushner characterbookideas I was doing that thing the infatuated do, stitching destiny onto the person we want stitched to us. Rachel Kushner infatuateddestinywant I was a child but weirdly uninhibited. I talked to people and inserted myself in all kinds of absurd situations. I think some of those life experiences influenced me in terms of the main character of The Flamethrowers. But for the parts where the community of artists are speaking above her level of participation, that probably came more out of my experience of being in New York in the '90s as an adult. Rachel Kushner artistcharacterchildren It's really a misconception to identify the writer with the main character, given that the author creates all the characters in the book. In certain ways, I'm every character. Then again, there is a huge gap between me as a person and what I do in the novel. Rachel Kushner novelcharacterbook The novel is a big space, and a lot can happen. Just think about the parts of your life. How do we account for our own contradictions? The only way to understand them is to let them exist, as truths that indicate something about character. People are built of elements that don't fit together - and the conflict of that is their essential drive. Rachel Kushner characterpeoplethinking I love to be alone, I find it necessary, but I don't know if that's just how I am or if it's an essential ingredient to making, to art. Certainly on a practical level it is. But on the other hand, I think it's a myth that the creative inspiration is locked up inside the person and just needs a quiet space and the right "serious" brooding moment to get released. Rachel Kushner inspirationartthinking There was lots of pleasure in writing The Flamethrowers. Then again, what is pleasure? Some pleasure is easy and other kinds are never quite felt, existing only as the residue of hard work, or more as satisfaction than thrill. Rachel Kushner never-quithard-workwriting As to the "traditional filler of twenty-first century realist fiction," maybe that is something I avoid. I don't relate to standard psychologizing in novels. I don't really believe that the backstory is the story you need. And I don't believe it's more like life to get it - the buildup of "character" through psychological and family history, the whole idea of "knowing what the character wants." People in real life so often do not know what they want. People trick themselves, lie to themselves, fool themselves. It's called survival, and self-mythology. Rachel Kushner realbelievelying I do study Marcel Proust, for multiple technical virtuosities but also his swerve, as you say, between characters and in scenes. Certain films can help for that, too, in terms of understanding how multiple conversations at a table, or in a room, can take place and remain separate, and dissonant, and also gather themselves, accidentally, into a collective rhythm and an affect. Rachel Kushner understandinghelpingcharacter I had been thinking about rubber all along. Like as the novel's element, or base material. A lot of artists in the late '60s and early '70s worked with rubber and other forms that seemed like they connoted industrial detritus. Robert Morris, Eva Hesse. Rachel Kushner morrisartistthinking I think any time you deal with humans and the way they exploit one another and cause pain you are in the realm of politics, on some level. Rachel Kushner painthinking At a certain age just being around particular people is an event. Rachel Kushner agepeople It's unfortunately true that if you mess up a single detail of the art world the whole thing seems false, and most writers are not in a position to get the details right, because they don't hang around with artists. It's not something you can get the vague gist of. It's too specific. Rachel Kushner artistworldart My natural orientation has never been among a community of writers, really. For some reason my social world has always been in the art world. Rachel Kushner communityworldart
