Quote

The best advice on writing I've ever received is to take it seriously, because to do it well is all-consuming.

David Guterson

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

David Guterson
Age: 68
Born: 1956
Born: May 4
Journalist
Novelist
Screenwriter
Writer
Seattle
Washington
Writing
Received
Seriously
Advice
Best
Ever
Wells
Well
Take
Consuming

More quotes by David Guterson

Image
How could they say that they truly loved each other? They had simply grown up together, been children together, and the proximity of it, the closeness of it, had produced in them love s illusion. And yet - on the other hand - what was love if it wasn't this instinct she felt.
David Guterson
Image
accident ruled every corner of the universe except the chambers of the human heart.
David Guterson
Image
Fiction is socially meaningful.
David Guterson
Image
I think you have an obligation to share what you know as a writer.
David Guterson
Image
I write because something inner and unconscious forces me to. That is the first compulsion. The second is one of ethical and moral duty. I feel responsible to tell stories that inspire readers to consider more deeply who they are.
David Guterson
Image
At one level you're condemned to the voice you have. But within those confines, you have a certain amount of freedom to range among your possible voices.
David Guterson
Image
Everybody has a world, and that world is completely hidden until we begin to inquire. As soon as we do, that entire world opens to us and yields itself. And you see how full and complex it is.
David Guterson
Image
None of those other things makes a difference. Love is the strongest thing in the world, you know. Nothing can touch it. Nothing comes close. If we love each other we're safe from it all. Love is the biggest thing there is.
David Guterson
Image
When I went to college I took a creative writing class and decided in a week to be a writer.
David Guterson
Image
What some people interpret as brooding melancholy is serenity. I don't feel required to grasp all the time.
David Guterson
Image
To deny that there was this dark side of life would be like pretending that the cold of winter was somehow only a temporary illusion, a way station on the way to the higher reality of long, warm, pleasant summers. But summer, it turned out, was no more real than the snow that melted in wintertime.
David Guterson
Image
My book is traditional. It runs counter to the post-modern spirit.
David Guterson
Image
There are things in this universe that we cannot control, and then there are the things we can. . . . Let fate, coincidence, and accident conspire human beings must act on reason.
David Guterson
Image
The status quo was rote memorization and recitation in classrooms thronged with passive children who were sternly disciplined when they expressed individual needs.
David Guterson
Image
You should learn to say nothing that will cause you regret. You should not say what is not in your heart - or what is only in your heart for a moment. But you know this - silence is better.
David Guterson
Image
What sustains me is to be with my family and to write.
David Guterson
Image
I grew up in Seattle, but I always knew I wanted to leave.
David Guterson
Image
That the world was silent and cold and bare and that in this lay its terrible beauty
David Guterson
Image
When it comes time to sit down and write the next book, you're deathly afraid that you're not up to the task. That was certainly the case with me after Snow Falling on Cedars.
David Guterson
Image
Cities produce in me melancholy or a tension I don't need.
David Guterson