What the nostalgic past and the imaginary future seem to share in common is a form of idealism, perhaps a dream of… — Charles D'Ambrosio Believe Copy Share Image
I have lots of fiction in the drawer, but the essays I mostly kick out into the world, ready or not. Fiction… — Charles D'Ambrosio Essays Copy Share Image
I'm kind of a creature of the alt-weekly universe - my real education into higher culture was acquired in coffee shops, reading… — Charles D'Ambrosio Coffee Copy Share Image
Even with an assignment, I take over, I find a freedom and make the idea my own, and that's where you get… — Charles D'Ambrosio Different Copy Share Image
Nowadays I imagine people find freer and more accepting venues in blogs, on Tumblr and Instagram and Facebook, in the riot of… — Charles D'Ambrosio Accepting Copy Share Image
“...the boy saw faces disinigrate before his eyes, faces that fell to pieces, then disappeared, leaving a hole.” — Charles D'Ambrosio Copy Share Image
I like the desperado aspect of essays, the free lance, that mercenary kind of thing, so I just do it, without asking… — Charles D'Ambrosio Essays Copy Share Image
My presence isn't simply about "character" - I'm present in every part and particle of the thing, in the sound and rhythm… — Charles D'Ambrosio Breathe Copy Share Image
“She sighed. Ignatius, do you know what the opposite of love is? Hate, I said. Despair, Sister said. Despair is the opposite… — Charles D'Ambrosio Love Copy Share Image
“It's hard to kill yourself by taking Tylenol. You die from liver failure, which takes a long time...” — Charles D'Ambrosio Failure Copy Share Image
Too much me is annoying under any circumstance, but too much me in an essay, however personal, would mar the art. My… — Charles D'Ambrosio Annoying Copy Share Image
I suppose I like certainty as much as anyone else, but I also feel that the hidden costs are high, that we… — Charles D'Ambrosio Certainty Copy Share Image
The poet Amanda Nadelberg puts it nicely in an interview when she says "often what I listen for in poems is a… — Charles D'Ambrosio Computers Copy Share Image
Our nostalgic dreams of perfection thrive just as dangerously in the other direction too, in the imaginary future, that bold and tantalizing… — Charles D'Ambrosio Dream Copy Share Image
I'm not a very savvy operator - it's not who I am, it's not what I do - and so I have… — Charles D'Ambrosio Home Copy Share Image
“her knees, which looked, in the faint blue light, as though they'd been carved by water from a bar of soap.” — Charles D'Ambrosio Blue Light Copy Share Image
We need to be ambivalent - in the essay, and in life too. Ambivalence - having mixed feelings, entertaining contradiction, living with… — Charles D'Ambrosio Ambivalence Copy Share Image
My instinct tells me "purpose" is maybe the enemy of a good personal essay. In my own experience, I'm always lost and… — Charles D'Ambrosio Confused Copy Share Image
“You all have stories, Sandy said. And we have secrets” — Charles D'Ambrosio Storytelling Copy Share Image
In the short stories - if I can make a very lumpy contrast - in the short stories I feel like the… — Charles D'Ambrosio Assumption Copy Share Image
“Yeah, well, I wanted to be a screenwriter, and guess what? I am one. That's the other tragedy in life.” — Charles D'Ambrosio Life Copy Share Image
Really, I think among the many mistakes I've made over my life, one of them was caring so much about the short… — Charles D'Ambrosio Caring Copy Share Image
“My ideal life is a quiet one. I like to read, to sit still in the same chair, with the lampshade at… — Charles D'Ambrosio Books Copy Share Image
Sometimes I'll have an end in mind, but it's always false, always corny, just a dumb idea anyone could have, sitting on… — Charles D'Ambrosio Abstract Copy Share Image
Behind each piece, animating every attempt, is the echo of a precarious faith, that we are more intimately bound to one another… — Charles D'Ambrosio Brave Copy Share Image
