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I've always thought sleep was a wonderful invention. Not that being awake isn't nice too, of course. But when I get up in the morning, I think, boy, only fourteen more hours and I can be back to sleep again ... And I never dream, because it distracts my mind from pure sleeping.

Anne Tyler

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Anne Tyler
Age: 83
Born: 1941
Born: October 25
Librarian
Novelist
Short Story Writer
Writer
Minneapolis
Minnesota
Thinking
Hours
Pure
Dream
Boys
Thought
Courses
Back
Course
Distracts
Mind
Wonderful
Fourteen
Always
Sleep
Sleeping
Never
Nice
Awake
Think
Morning
Invention

More quotes by Anne Tyler

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I think it must be very hard to be one of the new young writers who are urged to put themselves forward when it may be the last thing on earth they'd be good at
Anne Tyler
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One sad thing about this world is that the acts that take the most out of you are usually the ones that people will never know about. (from 'Celestial Navigation')
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I do write long, long character notes - family background, history, details of appearance - much more than will ever appear in the novel. I think this is what lifts a book from that early calculated, artificial stage.
Anne Tyler
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I read so I can live more than one life in more than one place.
Anne Tyler
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Liam really enjoyed a good movie. He found it restful to watch people's conversations without being expected to join in. But he always felt sort of lonesome if he didn't have someone next to him to nudge in the ribs at the good parts.
Anne Tyler
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...it's closeness that does you in. Never get too close to people, son.
Anne Tyler
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Reading any piece of writing aloud is an acid test, particularly when it comes to dialogue. There were writers I'd always admired who suddenly rang false when I spoke their words in our living room.
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Sooner or later, even the sharpest pain became flattened.
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It is not how much you love someone, but who you are when you are with him.
Anne Tyler
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Some people are aware of everything that is going on everywhere at every moment in their lives.
Anne Tyler
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There's surprisingly little difference between writing from a male angle and from a female angle, but I feel more restricted in my language when I'm writing as a male character because males tend to sound less emotionally expressive than females.
Anne Tyler
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My writing day has grown shorter as I've aged, although it seems to produce the same number of pages.
Anne Tyler
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For me, writing something down was the only road out...I hated childhood, and spent it sitting behind a book waiting for adulthood to arrive. When I ran out of books I made up my own. At night, when I couldn't sleep, I made up stories in the dark.
Anne Tyler
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The hardest novel to write was Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant.
Anne Tyler
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I've always thought a hotel ought to offer optional small animals. I mean a cat to sleep on your bed at night, or a dog of some kind to act pleased when you come in. You ever notice how a hotel room feels so lifeless?
Anne Tyler
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But what I hope for from a book - either one that I write or one that I read - is transparency. I want the story to shine through. I don't want to think of the writer.
Anne Tyler
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I think I was born with the impression that what happened in books was much more reasonable, and interesting, and real, in some ways, than what happened in life.
Anne Tyler
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The Amateur Marriage grew out of the reflection that of all the opportunities to show differences in character, surely an unhappy marriage must be the richest.
Anne Tyler
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I wonder how many times we dream that kind of dream-something strange and illogical-and fail to realize God is trying to tell us something.
Anne Tyler
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Mostly it's lies, writing novels. You set out to tell an untrue story and you try to make it believable, even to yourself. Which calls for details any good lie does.
Anne Tyler