George Saunders

“Each night passed with a devastating sameness.”

— George Saunders

I actually do believe in life after death.

— George Saunders

“Our country is big, let us be big.”

— George Saunders

Err in the direction of kindness.

— George Saunders

“Ted, I swear to God, quothe he.”

— George Saunders

It's a big world, and I really like it.

— George Saunders

I read to make myself feel awake.

— George Saunders

“We’re done. Don’t you see?”

— George Saunders

“Why were we made just so, to find so many things that happened every day pretty?”

— George Saunders

If you want to be good, all you've got to do is be good.

— George Saunders

“A fat green crescent hung above the mad scene like a stolid judge, inured to all human folly.”

— George Saunders

“If you want your Storys to end happy, try being niser.”

— George Saunders

“They didn’t have to feel what you felt; they just had to be supported in feeling what they felt.”

— George Saunders

“As that gentleman passed through, I felt a kinship.”

— George Saunders

I try to keep my artistic opinions not so much "to myself" but "on myself."

— George Saunders

I don't feel like I have the intelligence to really inhabit a consistently high level of prose.

— George Saunders

You go to the marketplace and there are seventeen consciousnesses moving in and out. Sometimes you want the same shirt that I…

— George Saunders

As a writer I'm essentially just trying to impersonate a first-time reader, who picks up the story and has to decide, at…

— George Saunders

“You were just a caretaker. They didn't have to feel what you felt; they just had to be supported in feeling what…

— George Saunders

Sometimes I think fiction exists to model the way God might think of us, if God had the time and inclination to…

— George Saunders

I'm always aware of writing around things I can't do, and I've come to think that that's actually what 'style' is -…

— George Saunders

Twitter is a deliberate abstention. Somehow I hate the idea of there always being, in the back of my mind, this little…

— George Saunders

All along, my mantra was: Don't write unless it contributes to the emotion, and do anything you do in service of the…

— George Saunders

“Kill every dog, every cat, she said slowly. Kill every mouse, every bird. Kill every fish. Anyone objects, kill them too.”

— George Saunders

“I loved Monty Python for the wordplay--this sense that you didn’t have to squash your intelligence to be funny. In fact, you…

— George Saunders

I think in our time, you know, so much of the information we get is pre-polarized. Fiction has a way of reminding…

— George Saunders

To me, the process of writing is just reading what I've written and - like running your hand over one of those…

— George Saunders

“But hereby resolve to write in this book at least twenty minutes a night. (If discouraged, just think of how much will…

— George Saunders

The mind is a machine that is constantly asking: What would I prefer? Close your eyes, refuse to move, and watch what…

— George Saunders

The writer has to make pleasure for the reader - which, I think, is done by taking one's character's seriously and taking…

— George Saunders

All storytelling is kind of that - there's a bit of text that you put pressure on that spits out some desire…

— George Saunders

“He didn't like the thought of them knowing he'd been scared. Didn't like the thought of them knowing what a fool he'd…

— George Saunders

If you understand writing as primarily engaging an imaginary reader, well, you've kind of been doing that your whole life. You walk…

— George Saunders

With non-fiction writing I feel like I'm confined and driven by what actually happened. That makes the "plot". So it's a process…

— George Saunders

“Even for those thousands of young people who don’t get something out there [in a university writing program], the process is still…

— George Saunders

My theory for nonfiction is that nobody can be free of some kind of conceptions about whatever story they're writing. But if…

— George Saunders

“I hold the biscuits in front of his face and he stands up. "What do I have to do?" he says. "Nothing,"…

— George Saunders

“Mid-December then and still no snow. Strange Chicago crèches appeared in front yards: Baby Jesus, freed from the manger, leaned against a…

— George Saunders

“Sweet Evelyn, I think, I should have loved you better. Possessing perfect knowledge I hover above him as he hacks me to…

— George Saunders

“In a culture that is becoming ever more story-stupid, in which a representative of the Coca-Cola company can, with a straight face,…

— George Saunders