Writer Quotes by Tobias Wolff

The short story, on the other hand, is the perfect American form.

— Tobias Wolff

When I was about 14 or 15 I decided to become a writer and never for a moment since have I wanted…

— Tobias Wolff

A piece of writing is a dangerous thing," he said. "It can change your life.

— Tobias Wolff

“a true piece of writing is a dangerous thing. It can change your life.”

— Tobias Wolff

The reader really has to step up to the plate and read a short story.

— Tobias Wolff

Like so many writers I started writing stories because I didn't have much time for anything else.

— Tobias Wolff

To be a writer you need to see things as they are, and to see things as they are you need a…

— Tobias Wolff

But a lot of writers - and I'm one of them - do tend to feel dissatisfied. It makes you a little…

— Tobias Wolff

Because the more you write the more you're aware of the weight of your tradition and the difficulties of the form and…

— Tobias Wolff

And you can tell the writers who do it - Robert Stone, for example, who with each new novel is doing something…

— Tobias Wolff

You have to be kind of clued into them, they are a world of their own, and most people find them disappointing…

— Tobias Wolff

I try to help people become the best possible editors of their own work, to help them become conscious of the things…

— Tobias Wolff

What writers do is they tell their own story constantly through other people's stories. They imagine other people, and those other people…

— Tobias Wolff

That, for me, is a very important test of a young writer's commitment because most of them are going to have to…

— Tobias Wolff

Of course it's why you want to become a writer - because you have the liberty to do that, but once you…

— Tobias Wolff

There are very few professions in which people just sit down and think hard for five or six hours a day all…

— Tobias Wolff

In writing you work toward a result you won't see for years, and can't be sure you'll ever see. It takes stamina…

— Tobias Wolff

“In the very act of writing I felt pleased with what I did. There was the pleasure of having words come to…

— Tobias Wolff

“Writers, to my way of thinking, are no more free in their choices than most people. Our material chooses us; certain things…

— Tobias Wolff

One of the things that draws writers to writing is that they can get things right that they got wrong in real…

— Tobias Wolff

Writers cannot let themselves be servants of the official mythology. They have to, whatever the cost, say what truth they have to…

— Tobias Wolff