Basically for me a story can be anything. Anything you tell me, anything I read in the newspaper, in any mode. I… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
If you focus on literature through only one small element of it, like the more scientific element of linguistics, then where is… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
Especially students. I love to turn them on to a story. Some of them have to go see me as an assignment,… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
“But then, that’s the beauty of writing stories—each one is an exploratory journey in search of a reason and a shape. And… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
I've always been a huge fan of theatre and performance. The idea of just the human voice and just this night. Live… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
I'm pretty hardcore. I stick exactly to what I'm doing. So I write a novel in one period, and then I'll write… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
But then, that's the beauty of writing stories-each one is an exploratory journey in search of a reason and a shape. And… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
I'm just having fun making jokes and writing books. But you see me once a year, I come on when I have… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
I think it's a great thing to hear the author reading. I've listened to CDs of Cheever and Updike reading their stories… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
I don't know who they are[my characters] . They're entirely invented characters. Maybe that's how I've been able to write so many… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
Any story has a beginning, middle, and end, of course, but the question is, where do you start it exactly? It's about… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
I can't be reading novels when I'm writing a novel, because somebody's voice creeps in. The hardest thing to do is keep… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
I don't think we need a critic to negotiate with the audience. People say, "Who are you writing for?" I'm writing for… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
I go around with my books so much and I love to perform on stage, to remind everybody that the lights are… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
I have many enemies and they all think I'm being highfalutin calling it performance, but the word "reading" has a connotation of… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
They [my stories] evolve. If they're tightly constructed, it's because they're revised constantly as I move forward each day. That's where the… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
One of the problems I have with many writers is their stories are all somewhat similar. They might be very good, but… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
You don't write the kitchen scene just because you're eager to do it that day and you're avoiding something else. I think… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
Music is, by far, the best art. Nothing even comes close. It's so immediate and emotional. In writing, maybe ninety percent of… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
Everything we do is escapism, because we'll all be dead and everything we do is completely meaningless. Why brush your teeth? Why not be… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
The hardest thing in a novel is time. You've got [a line like] "two weeks later, he woke up with a headache," and you've… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
Writing is a channeling of an individual experience; so is reading. That's what's so exciting about this art form - it's interactive. — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
I'm pretty hardcore. I stick exactly to what I'm doing. So I write a novel in one period, and then I'll write stories in… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
Work saved me. Literature saved me. It sounds corny but it's absolutely true. I was going in the wrong direction, but after the 9,000th… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
There are always surprises. Life may be inveterately grim and the surprises disproportionately unpleasant, but it would be hardly worth living if there were… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
“Besides, to like something, to really like it and come out and say so, is taking a terrible risk. I mean, what if I'm… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
“I am concerned with social and environmental issues. What rational person is not? But advocacy and art do not mix. Art is a seduction.… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
Pleasure, I remind myself, is inseparable from its lawfully wedded mate, pain. — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
A glad zest and hopefulness might be inspired even in the most jaded and ennui-cursed, were there in our homes such simple, truthful natures… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
What I'm doing is exploring things. This is why I'm a fiction writer rather than an essayist or a politician or whatever. I just… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
“Who was she in high school? Little Miss Nobody. She could have embroidered it on her sweaters, tattooed it across her forehead. And in… — T.C. Boyle Copy Share Image
![“But then, that’s the beauty of writing stories—each one is an exploratory journey in search of a reason and a shape. And when you find that reason and that shape, there’s no feeling like it." [ Peter Wild Interviews TC Boyle , 3:AM Magazine, June 2003]” quote by T.C. Boyle](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/68b/t-c-boyle-8108_art_but-then-that-s-the-beauty-of-writing-st_1261960.jpg)
![“I don't know who they are[my characters] . They're entirely invented characters. Maybe that's how I've been able to write so many books, because there are no boundaries for me. I can write a completely fantastical story like "Swept Away" or "Blinded by the Light" and then a non-comic drama like…” quote by T.C. Boyle](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/ead/t-c-boyle-8108_able_i-don-t-know-who-they-are-my-characters_1148719.jpg)
![“They [my stories] evolve. If they're tightly constructed, it's because they're revised constantly as I move forward each day. That's where the structure inheres. It's all organic.” quote by T.C. Boyle](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/7c4/t-c-boyle-8108_change_they-my-stories-evolve-if-they-re-tightl_1920496.jpg)
![“The hardest thing in a novel is time. You've got [a line like] "two weeks later, he woke up with a headache," and you've got to add up that entire two weeks and what the date is and whether it works. That kind of stuff drives me crazy and if I don't have it exactly right, I can't move forward…” quote by T.C. Boyle](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/e6e/t-c-boyle-8108_add_the-hardest-thing-in-a-novel-is-time-you_81637.jpg)
