Be willing and unafraid to write badly, because often the bad stuff...forms a base on which to build something better. — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
The bottom line is that I like my first drafts to be blind, unconscious, messy efforts; that's what gets me the best… — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
Goon Squad' took about three years to write and that's the short end. My second novel, 'Look at Me,' took six years. — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
When I'm not writing, I feel an awareness that something's missing. If I go a long time, it becomes worse. I become… — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
I spend so long writing each of my novels that by the time I'm done with one, I'm ready to discover a… — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
In the case of 'Goon Squad,' which sold slowly for a long time despite the good reviews, those 'best of 2010' lists… — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
To some degree, we're all thinking about the same things. It's the zeitgeist. The trick, in a way, as a writer, is… — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
I haven’t had trouble with writer’s block. I think it’s because my process involves writing very badly. My first drafts are filled… — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
“Behind the desk was nothing but view-the whole city flung out in front of us the way street vendors fling out their towels packed… — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
I just think that, for my particular personality, feeling slightly invisible is always a help. — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
Between books, I have to throw out everything I did before, because the tools I've used to write the previous book will not only… — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
As a reader and a writer, I'm happiest when apparently mutually exclusive states can somehow coexist. — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
I teach intermittently, and while I enjoy it, I don't find that it's a calling for me. — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
Like all failed experiments, that one taught me something I didn’t expect: one key ingredient of so-called experience is the delusional faith that it… — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
“Thousands of solar panels lift and tilt at the same time, in the same way. I clutch at Dad's arm: "Why are they doing… — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
It was the hat. He looked sweet in the hat. How could a man in a fuzzy blue hat have used human bones to… — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
I was a stepchild in two different families. The hardest thing about being a stepchild is you know that in some way everything would… — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
“The seconds pass. I know what’s going on because it’s the same thing that always happens: give me something nice, something I love or… — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
I had this idea that I could hire myself out as a person to go on archeological digs and dig, without any training! I… — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
At night, the house thick with sleep, she would peer out her bedroom window at the trees and sky and feel the presence of… — Jennifer Egan Copy Share Image
