I'm a big believer in the complex realities of young people's lives. — Claire Messud Copy Share Image
In the world I've lived in, gay marriage, for example, seems completely logical. And yet there are many people who don't live… — Claire Messud Copy Share Image
There are people who live under the delusion that simply because they will it to be so, it will be so. — Claire Messud Copy Share Image
Women's anger is very scary to people, and to no one more than to other women, who think, 'My goodness, if I… — Claire Messud Copy Share Image
We are all unappealing. It is just a matter of how much we let people see it. — Claire Messud Copy Share Image
The people who don't read - who are they? How do they make sense of things? — Claire Messud Copy Share Image
For me, the watershed was Hurricane Katrina. If that didn't get people out on the streets, then what will? — Claire Messud Copy Share Image
An abiding preoccupation for me is how much of our lives are invisible and unknown by other people, like the Chekhov story… — Claire Messud Copy Share Image
The feeling I had several times in youth, when lying in a field staring up at the night sky, that I might… — Claire Messud Copy Share Image
We think that we know people from this constellation of points: 'I know that story. I know that girl. I've heard that… — Claire Messud Copy Share Image
If people like something you've done - or don't like it - this shouldn't determine what you write or how you write… — Claire Messud Copy Share Image
Nobody would know me from my own description of myself; which is why, when called upon (rarely, I grant) to provide an… — Claire Messud Copy Share Image
When you are the woman upstairs, nobody thinks of you first. Nobody calls you before anyone else, or sends you the first… — Claire Messud Copy Share Image
Popular success is a wonderful gift if it happens, but like money, it's not the motivation. The effort to create a work… — Claire Messud Copy Share Image
We live in a culture that wants to put a redemptive face on everything, so anger doesn't sit well with any of… — Claire Messud Copy Share Image
The effort to create a work of art that is true and potentially lasting, that is the very best work of art… — Claire Messud Copy Share Image
The professor husband of a friend of mine has likened children to the insane. I often think of it. He says that… — Claire Messud Copy Share Image
It's the strangest thing about being human: to know so much, to communicate so much, and yet always to fall so drastically… — Claire Messud Copy Share Image
I have said it somewhere - our literary lived lives are as important as our literally lived lives. — Claire Messud Copy Share
“Life is about deciding what matters. It’s about the fantasy that determines the reality. Have you ever asked yourself whether you’d rather fly or… — Claire Messud Copy Share
Life's funny. You have to find a way to keep going, to keep laughing, even after you realize that none of your dreams will… — Claire Messud Copy Share
It's the strangest thing about being human: to know so much, to communicate so much, and yet always to fall so drastically short of… — Claire Messud Copy Share
The fictional narratives that television, film, and the news provide for girls and young women are appalling. — Claire Messud Copy Share
“I don't want to sleep,' my mother said. 'I want -- for God's sake, I want to wake up.” — Claire Messud Copy Share
“It was supposed to say “Great Artist” on my tombstone, but if I died right now it would say “such a good teacher/daughter/friend” instead;… — Claire Messud Copy Share
“Live, my dear Nora. Satisfy your hunger. There's food all around you, you know.' 'What kind of food, I'd like to know?' 'Ah'-he smiled-… — Claire Messud Copy Share
I digress a lot - it's how I experience the world. I would like to write in a way that will convey that to… — Claire Messud Copy Share
We think that - as kids, you know - that kids make up stories and live in a sort of fictional place, but that,… — Claire Messud Copy Share
“It makes sense that if you stand almost daily in the middle of a perfect crescent of shore, with a vista open to eternity,… — Claire Messud Copy Share
“Once aware of my isolation, I was afraid not of it but of its interruption.” — Claire Messud Copy Share
“who I am in my head, very few people really get to see that. Almost none. It’s the most precious gift I can give,… — Claire Messud Copy Share
“My everyday Appleton life, my phones calls to my father, my occasional beers with friends, my Saturday-morning jobs around the reservoir - what was… — Claire Messud Copy Share
