Usually by the time I finish a book tour I've just about had it with the book. — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
When I look back over my novels what I find is that when I think I'm finished with a theme, I'm generally… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“Because—and don’t let anybody tell you different—novel writing is mostly triage (this now, that later) and obstinacy.” — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
I have to have a character worth caring about. I tend not to start writing books about people I don't have a… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
A lot of my characters in all of my books have a self-destructive urge. They'll do precisely the thing that they know… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
It's no secret that in my books I'm trying to make the comic and the serious rub up against each other just… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
Steve Yarbrough's Safe from the Neighbors will take your breath away. Ambitious, funny, sad, smart, and beautifully crafted, it's everything a novel… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
You use simple brushstrokes in a screenplay for things over which you would take much greater pains in a novel. — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
When authors who write literary fiction begin to write screenplays, everybody assumes that's the end. Here's another who's never going to write… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
I was pretty dead set against ever writing an academic novel. It's always been my view that there are already more than… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“I hear you don't write any more," he says... "Not true," I inform him. "You should see the margins of my student… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
About 15 years ago I went though a period of a year or so when I just couldn't find anything good. My… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
I want that which is hilarious and that which is heartbreaking to occupy the same territory in the book because I think… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
When I start getting close to the end of a novel, something registers in the back of my mind for the next… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“...he had to comfort himself with the firm conviction that most of what he objected to in Mohawk and the world at… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“It was from my mother that I learned reading was not a duty but a reward, and from her that I intuited… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“Novel writing is mostly triage (this now, that later) and obstinacy. Trying something, and when that doesn't work, trying something else. Welcoming… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
Movies have to handle time very efficiently. They're about stringing scenes together in the present. Novels aren't necessarily about that. — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
You can be interested in a Jane Smiley novel whether or not anyone says a word. She enters into her characters thoughts… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
My books are elegiac in the sense that they're odes to a nation that even I sometimes think may not exist anymore… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
Some authors have a very hard time understanding that in order to be faithful to the spirit of the book, it's almost… — Richard Russo Copy Share Image
“The problem with the contemplative life was that there was no end to contemplation, no fixed time limit after which thought had to be… — Richard Russo Copy Share
“That, very simply, was what adulthood must be all about—acquiring the skill to bury things more deeply. Out of sight and, whenever possible, out… — Richard Russo Copy Share
“Miles couldn't help admiring women for their ability to dismiss the evidence of their senses. If that's what explained it. If it wasn't simply… — Richard Russo Copy Share
That afternoon I came to understand that one of the deepest purposes of intellectual sophistication is to provide distance between us and our most… — Richard Russo Copy Share
“Lucy, who apparently had no idea his girlfriend's father held him in such low regard, agreed with Noonan that he was pushing the envelope,… — Richard Russo Copy Share
Movies have to handle time very efficiently. They're about stringing scenes together in the present. Novels aren't necessarily about that. — Richard Russo Copy Share
When authors who write literary fiction begin to write screenplays, everybody assumes that's the end. Here's another who's never going to write well again. — Richard Russo Copy Share
“There was something about spending money they didn't really have that made him optimistic about more coming in.” — Richard Russo Copy Share
Some authors have a very hard time understanding that in order to be faithful to the spirit of the book, it's almost always impossible… — Richard Russo Copy Share
HBO is really famous for hiring good people and staying out of their way until they ask for help, or need it. And that… — Richard Russo Copy Share
I don't think there's a shortage of material in the world. Or in my head. I just pray for continued good health, because I've… — Richard Russo Copy Share
Where was the middle ground between a sense of adventure and just plain sense? — Richard Russo Copy Share
“... Mr. Purty has cheered me up. The task he has chosen for himself, of wooing my mother with a bright red pickup truck,… — Richard Russo Copy Share
“So what? Few men, Miles reflected, lived so comfortably within the confines of a two.word personal philosophy.” — Richard Russo Copy Share
