Author's Decision Quotes

One thing I have noticed is that when you're a younger editor, you're more intense about it. As you go along, you relax a little. More and more, I feel that the book is the author's. You give the author your thoughts, and it's up to him or her to decide what to do.

When I first concluded to print the book, I made an honest effort to construct it in the third person.

I posted the first three chapters and I had enough people say that chapter two was dragging that I cut it out just before the book went to press. And I'm glad I did. The book is a lot better without it.

People wanted more advice. So I finally thought I could totally put this advice into a book.

If there was a turning point for me, it was 'The Bridges at Toko-Ri.' It is a very fine short novel. But it gave me very little satisfaction. Really. I decided I wasn't going to go down that avenue.

When 'Tracks' first came out, I was courted by Sydney Pollack. I had lunch with him, and he opened the conversation with, 'Honey, you ain't gonna like what I'm gonna do to your book.' I really liked him, but I turned him down, because - well, I was stupid. I also turned down a great deal of money.

The decision for me was whether to have 'The Father' be a book that told a story - from the point of view of this speaker, the daughter - without, as in the earlier books, then having a section on something else and a section on something else.

While 'A Blessed Child' might have been a more tough-minded book had Ullmann thrown a spanner into the works, it's not hard to understand her decision to keep things going.