Writing reminds you that you're never alone. Writing and reading is to be optimistic. Richard Flanagan More Quotes by Richard Flanagan More Quotes From Richard Flanagan We live in a material world, not a dramatic one. And truth resides not in melodrama, but in the precise measure of material things. Richard Flanagan measure live truth world We're a migrant nation made up of people who've been torn out of other worlds, and you'd think we would have some compassion. Richard Flanagan think you compassion people Since woodchipping began 32 years ago, Tasmanians have watched as one extraordinary place after another has been sacrificed. Beautiful places, holy places, lost not only to them, but forever. Richard Flanagan place forever lost beautiful War stories deal in death. War illuminates love, while love is the greatest expression of hope, without which any story rings untrue to life. And to deny hope in a story about such darkness is to create false art. Richard Flanagan hope love life death 'The Bradshaws' is the appropriately inappropriate English title given to an enigma - some hundreds of thousands of mysterious rock art paintings scattered through the wilds of the Kimberley, an area larger than Germany in the remote, scarcely populated northwest of Australia. Richard Flanagan rock mysterious australia art Yep, I often lit the barbie with old drafts. Richard Flanagan old often lit barbie I come from a tiny mining town in the rainforest in an island at the end of the world. My grandparents were illiterate. Richard Flanagan grandparents island end world If war illuminates love, love offers the possibility of allowing some light to be brought back out of the shadows. It's almost as if they buttress and make possible an understanding of each other. Richard Flanagan shadows light love war I love words because you can only live one life, but in a novel, you can live a thousand: you contain multitudes. Richard Flanagan words you love life If 30 Australians drowned in Sydney Harbour, it would be a national tragedy. But when 30 or more refugees drown off the Australian coast, it is a political question. Richard Flanagan question more political tragedy John Howard, willing to apologise to home owners for rising interest rates, would not say sorry to Aborigines. He refused to condone what he referred to as 'a black armband version' of history, preferring a jingoistic nationalism. Richard Flanagan black sorry home history Through the 1990s, the fracturing of Tasmanian Aboriginal politics was given impetus by the ongoing corruption of a number of black organisations started under federal government programmes, with large amounts of public money being lost. Richard Flanagan black corruption politics money The past is there, but life is circular. I have a strong sense of the circularity of time. Richard Flanagan strong time life past I realised that if I wished to write about the dark and not allow for hope, people would recognise it as false - because hope is the nub of what we are. Richard Flanagan write hope dark people I get more optimistic as I get older. Richard Flanagan older more get optimistic If you choose to take your compass from power, in the end you find only despair. But if you look around the world you can see and touch - the everyday world that is too easily dismissed as everyday - you see largeness, generosity, hope, change for the better. It's always small, but it's real. Richard Flanagan you change power hope I do not come out of a literary tradition. Richard Flanagan literary out come tradition You can be very successful but still struggling financially, and it looked like I'd have to take a year or two off and find whatever menial labouring work you can get as a middle-aged, unskilled bald man. Richard Flanagan bald you man work When I was younger, I was full of smart things to say about all my books. Richard Flanagan books say things smart God gets the great stories. Novelists must make do with more mundane fictions. Richard Flanagan make more great god
