No book includes the entire world. It's limited. And so it doesn't seem like an aesthetic compromise to have to do that.… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
Don't be a writer, it's a terrible way to live your life, there's nothing to be gained from it but poverty and… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
I write different kinds of sentences, depending on what the book is, and what the project is. I see my work evolving.… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
After something crystallizes, I can write ferociously and write novels in six months, which in the past would have taken me two… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
Nobody asks you to do this. The world out there is not panting after another novelist. We choose it. — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
I don't read reviews any more, but I'm told by my publisher who gives me an account of what people have been… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
I think most writers can't really think about their work without a kind of revulsion. And I think that's probably why we… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
I woke up one day and thought: 'I want to write a book about the history of my body.' I could justify… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
Writing makes you feel that there is a reason to go on living. If I couldn't write, I would stop breathing. — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
For example, when I was writing Leviathan, which was written both in New York and in Vermont - I think there were… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
To care about words, to have a stake in what is written, to believe in the power of books - this overwhelms… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
I was extremely shy. And I simply didn't know how to go about it. It seemed a lot easier to write than… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
I sometimes feel that my goal as a novelist would be to write a novel in which the language was so transparent… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
Every novel is an equal collaboration between the writer and the reader and it is the only place in the world where… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
Surely it is an odd way to spend your life - sitting alone in a room with a pen in your hand,… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
And that's why books are never going to die. It's impossible. It's the only time we really go into the mind of… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
I feel I'm discovering something new, a different rhythm, and I guess these rhythms have a lot to do with walking, too,… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
I started out in life as a poet; I was only writing poetry all through my 20s. It wasn't until I was… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
There are two kinds of typical days. There's the typical day when I'm writing a novel, and there's the typical day when… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
In fact, writing, especially writing autobiographical works, and this is actually the fourth time I've done it, each time I've done it… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
I don't think of myself as a metafictional writer at all. I think of myself as a classic writer, a realist writer,… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
I thought, "Well, I'm writing about early childhood, so maybe it would make sense to write about late childhood as well, early… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
I really, truly believe that writing comes out of the body; of course, the mind is working as well, but it's a… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
I think that sense of unreality inspired me to write the story within the book that [August] Brill tells himself, one of… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
I don't even own a computer. I write by hand then I type it up on an old manual typewriter. But I… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
“On his best walks, he was able to feel that he was nowhere. And this, finally, was all he ever asked of things: to… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
“No es que escribir me produzca un gran placer, pero es mucho peor si no lo hago.” — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
You see, the interesting thing about books, as opposed, say, to films, is that it's always just one person encountering the book, it's not… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
The joke is the purest, most essential form of storytelling. Every word has to count. — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
“What people saw when he appeared before them, then, was not really him, but a person he had invented, an artificial creature he could… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
I had made an empirical discovery and it carried all the weight of a mathematical proof. — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
As long as there's one person to believe it, there's no story that can't be true. — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
Writing has always had a tactile quality for me. It's a physical experience. — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
People look at the same passage, and one person will say this is the best thing he's ever read, and another person will say… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
I was very moved to see that the name of the boat was Hamlet - an imaginary character becomes so important to people, we… — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
Our lifelong certainties about the world can be demolished in a single second. — Paul Auster Copy Share Image
