“They were afraid of dying, but they were even more afraid to show it.” — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
In the attic, a warhead no doubt burns. Everything is combustible. Faith burns. Trust burns. Everything burns to nothing and even nothing… — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
“To generalize about war is like generalizing about peace. Almost everything is true. Almost nothing is true. At its core, perhaps, war… — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
“Well, right now I'm not dead. But when I am, it's like...I don't know, I guess it's like being inside a book… — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
Each of us, I suppose needs his illusions. Life after death. A maker of planets. A woman to love, a man to… — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
It’s a hard thing to explain to somebody who hasn’t felt it, but the presence of death and danger has a way… — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
“Proximity to death brings with it a corresponding proximity to life.” — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
It's a hard thing to explain to somebody who hasn't felt it, but the presence of death and danger has a way… — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
“The days seemed to stretch out toward infinity, blank and humid, without purpose, and at night I was kept awake by the… — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
“You learn, finally, that you'll die, and so you try to hang on to your own life, that gentle, naive kid you… — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
“Yes, the issue was courage. It always had been, even as a kid. Things scared him. He couldn't help it. Noise scared him, dark… — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
It's very hard to articulate the things that are important about writing. — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
The thing about a story is that you dream it as you tell it, hoping that others might then dream along with you, and… — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
Fiction, maybe art in general, is a tentative, uncertain enterprise; it's not science, it's an exploration, but you never find much in the way… — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
“I learned that words make a difference. It's easier to cope with a kicked bucked than a corpse; if it isn't human, it doesn't… — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
“Stories are for eternity, when memory is erased, when there is nothing to remember except the story.” — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
“The story' Sanders would say "the whole tone, man, you're wrecking it." Tone?' The sound. You need to get a consitent sound, like slow… — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
“On occasions the war was like a Ping-Pong ball. You could put fancy spin on it, you could make it dance.” — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
“They were afraid of dying, but they were even more afraid to show it.” — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
“Forty-three years old, and the war occurred half a lifetime ago, and yet the remembering makes it now. And sometimes remembering will lead to… — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
“He thought about the difference between good times and bad times, and how funny it was that he could not state the difference, only… — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
A lie, sometimes, can be truer than the truth, which is why fiction gets written. — Tim O'Brien Copy Share Image
