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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

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David Guterson
Age: 68
Born: 1956
Born: May 4
Journalist
Novelist
Screenwriter
Writer
Seattle
Washington
Level
Amount
Levels
Possible
Confines
Within
Condemned
Freedom
Voices
Voice
Range
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More quotes by David Guterson

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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.
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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.
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What some people interpret as brooding melancholy is serenity. I don't feel required to grasp all the time.
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Time made me change. I gradually woke up to the realization that this is who I am, an author, a public figure, and I couldn't just hide in my study, tapping away at the keyboard and pretend that I didn't have a role to play beyond stringing words together.
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My book is traditional. It runs counter to the post-modern spirit.
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The best advice on writing I've ever received is to take it seriously, because to do it well is all-consuming.
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He didn't like very many people any more, or very many things either. He preferred not to be this way, but there it was, he was like that. His cynicism, a veteran's cynicism, was a thing that disturbed him all the time.
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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.
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We should recognize that schools will never solve the bedrock problems of education because the problems are problems of families, of cultural pressures that the schools reflect and thus cannot really remedy.
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Fiction is socially meaningful.
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I think of myself as a really happy person.
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I often heard about his cases and I often sat in on his trials. In the late 1960s when I was growing up I wanted to be a crusader like him but I didn't want to wear a suit and commute.
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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.
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I have relaxed into my persona as an author, although I used to fight that.
David Guterson
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I think you have an obligation to share what you know as a writer.
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accident ruled every corner of the universe except the chambers of the human heart.
David Guterson
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I grew up in Seattle, but I always knew I wanted to leave.
David Guterson
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That the world was silent and cold and bare and that in this lay its terrible beauty
David Guterson
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I'm not an urban person.
David Guterson
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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