Deborah Eisenberg Quotes

I have two ideas for novels at the moment, neither of them all that conventional, but I'm not ready to choose between them yet, let alone settle down to the process of writing.

I read all the time. Sometimes I get asked if I've thought about writing a novel.

I love doing the research for the novels. For me, the writing is hard work.

If somebody says that they want to write a book but do not know what to write about, they will never write a book.

There's nothing worse than sitting down to write a novel and saying, 'Well, okay, I'm going to do something of high artistic worth.'

Usually after finishing a novel, I have a head full of bad ideas for the next one.

I write short stories. I write every day.

With a novel, no matter where I am in it, I'm fretting about it. Every time I write a book, it starts with great forward momentum. Then there seems to be a period where it slows down a bit, and other things intervene. Then I gain momentum.

I think there is often a 'what if' proposition that gets me thinking about all my novels.

I have some other novels I want to write. I have a lot of short stories - I love the short story.

I'm not nearly smart enough or imaginative enough to tackle the novel form. Never happen.

If you're writing a novel, you're in a room for three or four years. There's not much coming in from the outside.

I consider myself a writer. I don't favour any type of writing. I sometimes wish short stories came more easily to me.

I love to write. I write everything across the board - kids' stories and novels and scripts. I actually would like to give that a go; I'd like to try to be a writer.

I don't take notes. I don't have any notebooks. I keep on trying to do that because it seems like a very writerly thing to do, but my mind doesn't work that way. I tend to get the idea for a novel in a big splash.

When I want to read a novel, I write one.

I'm open to writing just about anything. I love writing the books that I write. They do tend to be on dark subjects, but I don't think of myself necessarily as a dark-humored person. I like having a lot of fun.

Of course I knew that writing was terrifically hard work and that there was no secret code, as in a video game, that would unlock Tolstoy-mode, enabling me to crank out canon-worthy novellas before lunch.

I remember how I would wait for a play idea. I wasted a tremendous amount of time. I didn't realize that ideas could be made into movies or novels.

I would like to one day write a nice big novel and enjoy writing it and people enjoy reading it but I cannae be bothered or I don't have any ideas that would fill up a big book like that.

I don't know how everyone writes a novel; that sounds exhausting.

I really want to write another novel, and I am trying to come up with what the story will be. As I learned with 'Groundswell,' I can't force it; I just have to wait for it to come to me.

It is very enjoyable, writing a story. You get this idea. It takes hold of you. And then you spend day and night thinking about how to do it. And then you do it. And much later, you think, 'Oh, yes. That's an interesting question.'

When I went to college I took a creative writing class and decided in a week to be a writer.

We had to do the same thing here. To top that sequel was quite a task. Mike had a couple of good conceptual humour and character ideas, which got me back into it.