One thing that fiction does is it allows us to take big picture questions, big issues, big moral and socio-political changes and see how they play out on real people's lives, with real individuals. Ben H. Winters More Quotes by Ben H. Winters More Quotes From Ben H. Winters A pool of melancholy blooms in my chest and rushes into my body like deep-blue blood. Ben H. Winters blue depression blood It must be that there is something in the hearts of human beings, some natural fluid perhaps, that insists on happiness, even confronted with the most powerful arguments against it. Ben H. Winters argument powerful heart There is little novelty in the detective who cannot solve himself. Ben H. Winters novelty detectives littles Fiction has this special power. It has a power to clarify, to galvanize, to prophesy, and warn. Ben H. Winters special fiction Because as any writer will tell you, an IDEA for a book is like falling in love, it's all wild emotion and headlong rush, but the ACTUAL ACT of writing a book is like building a relationship: it is joyous, slow, fragile, frustrating, exhilarating, painstaking, exhausting, worth it. Ben H. Winters falling-in-love writing book It is part of what makes America great. That tradition of the free press, and also the tradition of this highly competitive market for investigative journalism. We're seeing, there's no question, that we're seeing a renaissance of that. Ben H. Winters renaissance journalism america There is no shortage of ways that people profit indirectly from the misery and cruelty in other places. Even now, the shirts we wear and the tomatoes we eat. There are unfortunately unfair and inhumane conditions - including literal slavery - all over the world. Ben H. Winters slavery people world It is really something, the extent to which we allow ourselves to live without thinking of things that we know, in the abstract, are bad, and are going on right now, somewhere far away. We think, "Well, what are you gonna do?" In a way, that little instinct, that "What are you gonna do?" is the most dangerous thing in the world. Ben H. Winters far-away world thinking We forget the conditions - not only in slavery - but after slavery, when there was this purposeful locking out of African Americans from economic opportunity. Or we forget today's incarceration rates, and educational and housing discrimination; all of these things. We pretend that everything that has happened happened long ago, and then we act as if we all now just treat each other equally, everything will be fine. Ben H. Winters educational opportunity long In terms of optimism, I am optimistic. I do think that, in the long term, that America will right itself. I have to think so. Ben H. Winters optimistic america thinking History is not the linear sort of movement toward better and better things. Ben H. Winters linear movement That one lesson that African American communities have learned over the centuries in America is that you can't just take for granted that things will steadily get better and better and better until they're great. It is fits and starts. It is backward and forward. Ben H. Winters get-better community america The membrane between where we are right now and a very different reality, is so much thinner than we like to think. Things can go back, and things can go to the side, and things can go to places where we might not even have been on guard that they might go. I think that if there is a great gift that this [Donald Trump] election gave us, is this sort of sense of vigilance, the sense that we have to remain on guard. We have to support our free press. Ben H. Winters support reality thinking Here in America we have a man [Donald Trump] who is a master of a medium that is all about self-aggrandizement and/or cruelty to others. I have been off Twitter lately because I had this sudden sort of feeling of, this man is the president of this club and it's not a club that I want to be in. Sometimes I feel like, well, perhaps it's not right because as a political activist, this is where politics is happening right now. This is where the conversation is going on, but at the same time, I think there is something corrosive about it. Ben H. Winters men america thinking I think it's a very stark marker of what kind of president we have that, from all available evidence, Donald Trump has not read a book, as an adult. This is not someone who sits down in the evening to consider the latest bestseller, let alone Tolstoy - but who is very very active on this medium that requires no discipline and no attention and no empathy. It is all about retweeting praise of oneself or very quickly or poorly considered, ill-typed, misspelled diatribes against other people. Ben H. Winters discipline book thinking A book is not a tweet. A book is not a half-hour television show. A book requires for both reader and writer sustained discipline attention. It asks you to immerse yourself in something and really deeply feel it. Ben H. Winters discipline half book I think that one thing fiction can offer, and must offer, is a place where someone's mind and their imagination can come to rest for a little while. Ben H. Winters imagination mind thinking We spend so much time, these days, on forms of literature that don't rise to be literature, and I'm speaking about Twitter posts and quick and hot takes on different websites. We sort of zoom from thing to thing like a hummingbird. Ben H. Winters zoom different hot I think that fiction has this special responsibility or this special ability to help people to empathize, to demand of people that they understand other individuals and other people's experiences. Ben H. Winters responsibility people thinking Our political divides have become our personal divides. Ben H. Winters divides political
