Writer Reader Quotes

It's true that misunderstanding and lack of understanding are often themes in my fiction, but I am grateful for the moments when true understanding is achieved, especially between writer and reader. It's miraculous.

People do tell a writer things that they don't tell others. I don't know why, unless it is that having read one or two of his books they feel on peculiarly intimate terms with him; or it may be that they dramatize themselves and, seeing themselves as it were as characters in a novel, are ready to be as open with him as they imagine the characters of his invention are.

I love telling stories. I love the intimacy between the writer and reader. When you write sketches it's over in two minutes. When you write a book the characters have to have a bit of emotional depth.

How often have I met and disliked writers whose books I love; and conversely, hated the books and then wound up liking the writer? Too often.

What any writer hopes for is that the reader will stick with you to the end of the contract and that there is a level of submission on the reader's part.

Only a generation of readers will span a generation of writers.

The sincerity of feeling that is possible between a writer and a reader is one of the finest things I know.

Part of the transaction between writer and reader is the pleasure of building a community and encouraging people to play along.

How often I have tried to tell writing students that the first thing a writer must do is love the reader and wish the reader well. The writer must trust the reader to be at least as intelligent as he is. Only in such well wishing and trust, only when the writer feels he is writing a letter to a good friend, only then will the magic happen.

The ideal reader cannot sleep when holding the writer he was meant to be with.

Words build a bridge between the imaginations of writer and reader, creating something unique between them.

If it is good literature, the reader and the writer will connect. It's inevitable.

A literary journal is intended to connect writer with reader; the role of the editor is to mediate.