If you think about it, fiction is nothing more than gossip about the people you've made up. — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
I grew up in a house without many books. The books the nuns made us read in school didn't interest me. — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
Novels are written, not wished into existence. You have to sit your ass in the chair or nothing gets done. — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
Fiction begins with the senses, and the senses go to work in a place. — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
As a writer you can and should expect to hear conflicting responses to your story. — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
I revise like crazy. I start revising before the pen hits the paper. — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
“The purpose of the first draft is not to get it right, but to get it written.” — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
With each draft, the work gets better, and usually that means tighter. It means getting the precise word, not the approximate word. — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
In revision, your imagination becomes deeply engaged with your material. It's when you come to know your characters and begin to perceive… — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
The facts, however, are unimportant in fiction. It's not the events of my life that I mine, but the emotional experiences I've… — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
It's easier to write about a place sometimes when you've left it, when you can apply your imagination to your memory and… — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
You will feel discouraged; you will lose confidence in your abilities; you will be bored with the characters–and the only way to… — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
I write with a fountain pen. And then revise word by word and line by line so that the first draft of… — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
Revision is not the end of the creative process, but a new beginning. It's a chance not just to clean up and… — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
Reading is also a creative activity if you're doing it right. You can learn more from a story that's left the tracks… — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
What you create when you're teaching fiction writing is a kind of literary salon, not a social club or a mutual admiration… — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
“Inez and I had been in the same book club for a while. She once told me that literary theory was reading… — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
You lose a wallet or keys or something and you notice in a second, but your life can go missing and you don't even… — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
“At 9:15 on Thursday morning, June 4, while Jordan Delreese was bludgeoning his two young children to death, I was sitting in Dr. Hamburger's… — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
You will feel discouraged; you will lose confidence in your abilities; you will be bored with the characters–and the only way to overcome these… — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
There were the fairy tales my father told to me at bedtime. All the standards. I thought my father invented wolves. — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
If you think about it, fiction is nothing more than gossip about the people you've made up. — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
I revise like crazy. I start revising before the pen hits the paper. — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
“I loved her for what I couldn't understand about her. Love searches for the mystery in the beloved, seeks the unknowable.” — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
“I told her how I thought you could always revise your life, how you could work and work on it, finesse the details, see… — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
I write with a fountain pen. And then revise word by word and line by line so that the first draft of a scene… — John Dufresne Copy Share Image
