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" I read widely - for news, the arts, science, for entertainment, and the value of being informed - and, as a fiction writer, I can't help transposing what I learn into the scenario for a novel or story. "

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" I never go anywhere without a book for fear of being stuck in line in front of the theater or strapped down in the dentist's chair and being bored witless. Thus, I read everywhere. "

T. C. Boyle

Chair

Never

Fear

" It's hard to say how certain stories just punch us in the heart and the brain at the same time at the end. I suppose that's what we're all looking for. But each story has its own valence, its own way of saying goodbye to you. "

" I can't read novels while I'm writing a novel, because somebody's voice creeps in. "

" I am a worrier. I worry about the state of our country, of the world, of our species. Every day seems to deliver a new nail to hammer into our collective coffin. "

" Books are up against TV and movies and video games and a multimedia society that is so busy that people don't have contemplative time any more. I worry deeply about this. In fact, I worry about everything all the time. I used to be a punk. All I wanted to do was tear everything down, and that was so much easier. "

" I've always written about heroes and wondered who they are. "

" It's true that none of my characters are admirable. But maybe I'm primarily a satirist, and a satirist needs to hold up what's not admirable. "

T. C. Boyle

Hold

Admirable

" Art saved me. It may sound corny, but it's true. "

T. C. Boyle

True

Sound

" I really like the power of stopping the laughter and turning it to horror. "

" The compulsively readable events of my life occurred mainly in infancy, and it's been pretty humdrum ever since. "

" In previous generations, there was purpose; you had to die, but there was God, and literature and culture would go on. Now, there is no God, and our species is imminently doomed, so there is no purpose. We get up, raise families, have bank accounts, fix our teeth and everything else. But really, there is utterly no purpose except to be alive. "

" I worry about everything in the world, and it's just too much for anybody to think about, so I have my art as my consolation. "

" The novel is a seduction; a reader has to be seduced. "

" I can't fathom writers married to writers and musicians married to musicians. There's your enemy in bed beside you. "

" Sometimes, we find common ground; more often, we don't. "

" You want, as an artist, to be pushing yourself to do what you haven't done before. "

" What is your identity, and how do you know who you are if you don't have language? "

" I think that's what art is about: to provoke you. It helps me make sense of a senseless universe because I become the god of the story. I create it, and I see it in all its lineaments in my own way and can control it - in a world in which everything else is out of control. "

" I describe myself as an environmentalist not because I'm marching in the street with placards but because I like to be in the woods by myself. "

T. C. Boyle

Because

Myself

" I do not want to repeat myself. I want to reach for something I've never attained. This is the excitement of art. "

" I'm not looking ahead joyfully to the rest of my life or the future of the human race. I've always written about man as an animal species among other animals, competing for limited resources. Our population is exploding. Our environment is dying. Science has debunked God. "

" Of course all novelists are egomaniacs and want to draw everyone to their fold just like any other preacher. The snake-oil peddler, the false prophet, all of this is fascinating to me. But I certainly hope that I'm more humane than that. "

T. C. Boyle

Hope

" I like to live in my own mind, regardless of everyone and everything, working out the intimate puzzles that are my stories and novels. "

T. C. Boyle

Working

Own

" I don't care if the audience is 600 Saul Bellows; I'm going to knock them dead with a comedy routine. I'm out there as a missionary for literature because, if people laugh and enjoy themselves, they might actually do something as bizarre as reading the book. "

" Science has killed religion. There's no hope for the future with seven billion of us on the planet, and the only thing you can do is to laugh in the face of it all. "

" I think, if I'm doing my job correctly, I'm presenting a scenario for you as the reader to engage with on your own. I mean, that's what the best art is supposed to do. It's not supposed to be political. I think if you read all my books, you know where I stand, pretty much. "

" I'm just kind of fascinated by how we can deny that we are animals and what our impact on the other animals is like, and how quixotic we can be in trying to assess what we've done in trying to correct it. "

" One of the reasons I've been able to be productive is that I want to do everything. "

" I'm enslaved to writing to the point where I sacrifice almost everything else. "

" It's just my natural way - to be funny. I don't know why that is. But as I've said, humor is a quick cover for shock, horror, confusion. The critics hate funny writers for the most part. They think funny is not serious, but I think that funny can be even more serious than nonfunny. And it can be more affecting, too. "