In a sense my whole life as a writer is trying to find structural ways, or formal ways, to permit that outflowing… — George Saunders Copy Share Image
Fiction is a kind of compassion-generating machine that saves us from sloth. Is life kind or cruel? Yes, Literature answers. Are people… — George Saunders Copy Share Image
That's one of the reasons I take a lot of consolation in fiction. You have years to work on it. I think… — George Saunders Copy Share Image
My general approach to writing fiction is that you try to have as few conceptual notions as possible and you just respond… — George Saunders Copy Share Image
I've had that situation where I start writing somebody really miserable, and in order to make the story come alive, I have… — George Saunders Copy Share Image
There were several points where I would kind of turn to the book and say, "Get thee behind me." I don't think… — George Saunders Copy Share Image
From the perspective of someone with two grown and wonderful kids, that your instincts as parents are correct: a minute spent reading… — George Saunders Copy Share Image
As Flannery O'Connor says, a person can choose what she writes but she can't choose what she makes live. Some people are… — George Saunders Copy Share Image
I sometimes think that I can't do the bigger thing that [Zadie Smith] do so beautifully, as in Swing Time, with so… — George Saunders Copy Share Image
One lesson I learned the hard way, early in my career, was that if I tried to write to be smart or… — George Saunders Copy Share Image
Success is like a mountain in front of you that keeps growing. If you're not careful, it will take up your whole life. — George Saunders Copy Share
“Wow wow wow is all I can say! Remember how I always buy lunchtime Scratch-Off ticket? Have I said? Maybe did not say? Well,… — George Saunders Copy Share
“None of it was real; nothing was real. Everything was real; inconceivably real, infinitely dear. These and all things started as nothing, latent within… — George Saunders Copy Share
“We must see God not as a Him (some linear rewarding fellow) but an IT, a great beast beyond our understanding, who wants something… — George Saunders Copy Share
America, to me, should be shouting all the time, a bunch of shouting voices, most of them wrong, some of them nuts, but please,… — George Saunders Copy Share
In my case, when I am trying to be "kind" I often default in a sort of toothless loving-all stance that is, actually, not… — George Saunders Copy Share
Whatever your supposed politics are - left, right - if you put it in a human connection, most people will rise to the occasion… — George Saunders Copy Share
“A Clinton staffer tells me his theory. Think about Frank Sinatra, he says: born to sing. Think about Willie Mays: born to play ball.… — George Saunders Copy Share
We try, we fail, we posture, we aspire, we pontificate - and then we age, shrink, die, and vanish. — George Saunders Copy Share
“You were torturing a cat," she says. "With a freaking prod." "A prod I built myself in metal shop," he says. "But of course… — George Saunders Copy Share
“Rachel got up and did this happy little shuffle, like she was some cheerful farmer chick who'd just stepped outside to find the hick… — George Saunders Copy Share
What America is, to me, is a guy doesn't want to buy, you let him not buy, you respect his not buying. A guy… — George Saunders Copy Share
What good the prophet in the wilderness may do is incremental and personal. It's good for us to hear someone speak the irrational truth.… — George Saunders Copy Share
We're in the transition between birth and death. But the one that people often know about is the transition between the moment of death… — George Saunders Copy Share
You don't want to be that parent - the one who dresses his kid in a cloth sack when all the other kids are… — George Saunders Copy Share
![“I sometimes think that I can't do the bigger thing that [Zadie Smith] do so beautifully, as in Swing Time, with so much world in it and so much rapturous paint thrown around. I don't think it would be possible to write a book on that scale with as much OCD as I have.” quote by George Saunders](https://sms4smile.com/q/img-quotes/793/george-saunders-317_bigger_i-sometimes-think-that-i-can-t-do-the-bi_3125094.jpg)
