“Whether anybody was home meant everything to a house. It was more than a major fact: it was the only fact. The… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
When I finally gave up any hope of doing anything representative of the American family, I actually seemed to have tapped into… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
Depression, when it's clinical, is not a metaphor. It runs in families, and it's known to respond to medication and to counseling.… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
It's not surprising to see in my own work, looking back, and in the work of some of my peers, an attention… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
“She had a lifetime of practice at arriving late in a family of four and being loved by all.” — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
“The only mainstream American household I know well is the one I grew up in, and I can report that my father,… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
If you read the biographies of people who have written good books, you often see the point where they suddenly come into… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
Family's the one thing you can't change. You can cover yourself with tattoos. You can get a grapefruit-sized ring going through your… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
“There was, of course, nowhere better in the world to be than New York City. This fact was the foundation of her… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
“My conception of a novel is that it ought to be a personal struggle, a direct and total engagement with the author's… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
“She told herself a story about a daughter in a family so hungry for a daughter that it would have eaten her… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
“The fundamental fact about all of us is that we’re alive for a while but will die before long. This fact is the real… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
Fiction that isn't an author's personal adventure into the frightening or the unknown isn't worth writing for anything but money. — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
“Parents are programmed to want the best for their kids, regardless of what they get in return. That's what love is supposed to be… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
“Birds were what became of dinosaurs. Those mountains of flesh whose petrified bones were on display at the Museum of Natural History had done… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
“Can a better kind of fiction save the world? There’s always some tiny hope (strange things do happen), but the answer is almost certainly… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
A big part of me would be very proud never having anything of mine adapted, because if you want the real experience, there's only… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
Seriously, the world is changing so quickly that if you had any more than 80 years of change I dont see how you could… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
“I'm saying the structure and f the entire culture is flawed, chip said. I'm saying the bureaucracy has arrogated the right to define certain… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
Integrity's a neutral value. Hyenas have integrity, too. They're pure hyena. — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
“An odd thing about beauty, however, is that it's absence tends not to arouse our sympathy as much as other forms of privation do.” — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
He became another data point in the American experiment of self-government, an experiment statistically skewed from the outset, because it wasn't the people with… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
“It was this motley band of modest peeps and plovers on the beach who reminded me of the human beings I loved best -… — Jonathan Franzen Copy Share Image
