Quote

We stay in the house so much because I am waiting for the telephone. I seem to be back in my teens, a period I thought I would never have to endure again: my life is spent hoping for things that only someone else can bring about.

Anne Tyler

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Anne Tyler
Age: 83
Born: 1941
Born: October 25
Librarian
Novelist
Short Story Writer
Writer
Minneapolis
Minnesota
Back
Seem
Telephones
Much
Bring
Teens
Things
Waiting
Hoping
Never
House
Endure
Would
Else
Period
Life
Someone
Spent
Thought
Periods
Seems
Stay
Telephone

More quotes by Anne Tyler

Image
It is very difficult to live among people you love and hold back from offering them advice.
Anne Tyler
Image
I spend about a year between novels
Anne Tyler
Image
I expect that any day now, I will have said all I have to say I'll have used up all my characters, and then I'll be free to get on with my real life.
Anne Tyler
Image
He was wondering if there was some cryptic, cultish mark on his door that told all the crazy people he'd have trouble saying no.
Anne Tyler
Image
My decision to start a new one is just that, a decision, since I never get inspirations.
Anne Tyler
Image
In real life I avoid all parties altogether, but on paper I can mingle with the best of them
Anne Tyler
Image
Smells could bring a person back clearer than pictures even could.
Anne Tyler
Image
I don't know what takes more courage: surviving a lifelong endurance test because you once made a promise or breaking free, disrupting all your world.
Anne Tyler
Image
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
Image
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
Image
...he thought of dying as a kind of adventure, something new that he hadn't yet experienced. Like an unusual vacation trip.
Anne Tyler
Image
Once your mind is caught on the right snag, there's nothing so hard about the mechanics of writing.
Anne Tyler
Image
Now peculiar scraps of knowledge were stuck to him like lint from all his jobs.
Anne Tyler
Image
While armchair travelers dream of going places, traveling armchairs dream of staying put.
Anne Tyler
Image
I hated childhood, and spent it sitting behind a book waiting for adulthood to arrive.
Anne Tyler
Image
I never think about the actual process of writing. I suppose I have a superstition about examining it too closely.
Anne Tyler
Image
My family can always tell when I'm well into a novel because the meals get very crummy.
Anne Tyler
Image
But if you never did anything you couldn't undo you'd end up doing nothing at all.
Anne Tyler
Image
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
Image
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