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" My instinct is to write under the cloak of an opaque historical setting. "
Patrick deWitt
Historical
Write
Setting
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" After school, I got a job in a shop in Hollywood and shared an apartment with a friend. I promptly lost my job and got evicted from my apartment, and that happened several times. "
Patrick deWitt
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" A lot of my favourite books - I should say, not much happens in the books! It's much more about the points of view of the author more than anything else. "
Patrick deWitt
More
View
Books
" I was halfway through a rough draft of 'The Sisters Brothers' when it came time to start the 'Terri' adaptation. "
Patrick deWitt
Time
Halfway
Start
" I've fallen in love in my life a few times. It's the most exciting part of being alive - that I've experienced, anyway. "
Patrick deWitt
Life
Most
My Life
" I haven't read a lot of Westerns. But I wrote a Western. The influences were all cinematic. "
Patrick deWitt
Read
Westerns
Influences
" I haven't read hardly any Westerns, to tell you the truth. "
Patrick deWitt
Hardly
You
Westerns
" All of my close friends are emotional train wrecks. This is what makes our lives interesting - constantly doubting ourselves, worrying, wondering if we've made a mistake. Could we have done better? Are we good people? Are we bad people? "
Patrick deWitt
Good People
Mistake
People
" Especially if you're endeavouring daily to write your own books, you read with a degree of - well, it's hard to forget you're a writer when you're reading. "
Patrick deWitt
Hard
You
Daily
" At the age of seventeen, I decided I would spend my life writing fiction. I didn't know what this entailed, exactly - a room, I supposed. A room and books and paper and solitude. "
Patrick deWitt
Solitude
My Life
Life
" Some deeper part of me wants to write comical dialogue; I'd be foolish to not follow that impulse. Now I recognize that if there's energy to a section of work, you go where the energy is. It's a living thing, and you just follow it. "
Patrick deWitt
Work
Me
Energy
" When you meet someone you love, whether or not they love you back, something occurs in you that makes you want to improve yourself. "
Patrick deWitt
You
Back
Love
" Working in a bar was a horrific idea for me. "
Patrick deWitt
Horrific
Working
Me
" I wouldn't want to write a biography of anyone. I'd feel too inhibited by the facts and too much pressure to do the subject's life justice. "
Patrick deWitt
Life
Facts
Feel
" Many's the dead author whose body of work has been marred by overzealous publishers or family members. If this happens to me, I vow to seek out the responsible parties and haunt them to the point of death. "
Patrick deWitt
Me
Body
Dead
" I carry a small spiral notebook with me at all times and have been doing this for many years. There's a shoe box in my closet filled with these notebooks, each riddled with notes and impressions, ideas, schemes, and soup recipes. "
Patrick deWitt
Small
Soup
Me
" Lies can be wonderful things, and when a lie is told artfully, if it's done with a degree of craftsmanship, I can't help but admire the liar. "
Patrick deWitt
Done
Help
Admire
" I had no plan to write a western novel, and when I realized it was happening, I was pretty surprised by it. But you have to go with what feels right. "
Patrick deWitt
Right
You
Go
" After 'The Sisters Brothers,' I tried to write a contemporary story dealing with an investment adviser in New York City who moves to Paris. I did all this research, but after about a year and any number of pages written, I was bored stiff. "
Patrick deWitt
New York
Paris
Research
" The impetus for 'The Sisters Brothers' was it occurred to me that there was no neurosis in westerns, or there's a minimal amount of it. "
Patrick deWitt
Sisters
Minimal
Me
" I come by writing dialogue fairly naturally, I've got a chatty family; I'm a bit of a voyeur, and if I'm ever in a public place, I automatically find myself listening. "
Patrick deWitt
Myself
Writing
Find
" I'm never doing anything by rote. I'm only on thin ice, and I think that that's a good place to be. I feel like when you push yourself like that, the rewards can be pretty great. "
Patrick deWitt
Yourself
Good
Great
" Love is dangerous; it's not something to be trifled with. As good as it feels on the way in, it feels that much worse on the way out. "
Patrick deWitt
Way
Love
Dangerous
" If you're not riddled with doubt, you've probably done something wrong. "
Patrick deWitt
Something
Doubt
Done
" I've always felt so fortunate to have writing to turn to every day. I'm obsessed with it. "
Patrick deWitt
Always
Day
Writing
" When your protagonist bores you, you're in trouble. "
Patrick deWitt
You
Protagonist
Your
" Looking around, I saw so many unhappy adults, people who loathed their jobs, and I didn't want to be one of them. "
Patrick deWitt
Looking
People
Jobs
" I think of myself as somebody who, in a moment-to-moment way, I'm quite happy. But I think I am a bit doubtful and wary of true happiness, and, like a lot of my friends, there's been a good degree of self-sabotage. "
Patrick deWitt
Myself
Happy
Good
" I am a bit prudish, I think. It's hard for me to write about sex, and I don't really care to read about it, either. "
Patrick deWitt
Think
Sex
Care
" I don't know that happy people are interesting to write about - or to read about. "
Patrick deWitt
Happy
Interesting
Know
" A lot of authors, judging by their list, will put anything out that they finish... That's the worst model I've heard of in my life. It's just idiotic. Why wouldn't you just wait for the good ones? "
Patrick deWitt
You
Wait
My Life