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Remember this... develop a sense of nostalgia for something, or you'll never figure out what's important.

Gary Shteyngart

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Gary Shteyngart
Age: 52
Born: 1972
Born: July 5
Journalist
Novelist
Writer
St. Petersburg
Remember
Important
Something
Never
Nostalgia
Develop
Figure
Figures
Sense

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freedom is anathema to dreams nurtured in captivity.
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People always write on my Facebook that they've seen somebody they thought was me on the subway, and I was cursing badly.
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Every returning New Yorker asks the question: Is this still my city? I have a ready answer, cloaked in obstinate despair: It is. And if it's not, I will love it all the more. I will love it to the point where it becomes mine again.
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She took my hand and pulled me after her, her shoulders giving off a sweet peppermint concoction that the bodies of young women sometimes produce to make my life more difficult.
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You are not what you want. You are what wants you back.
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Getting out of Russia was the best thing my parents did. I mean, that country will never amount to anything.
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Don't be pretentious is my first advice to young writers. This is the big problem - just because you're getting an MFA doesn't mean you have to write for the Academy. Be true to your personality. Don't temper your personality down with words. Don't build defensive fortresses around yourself with words - words are your friends.
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Alcohol causes a lot of problems, and then to solve these problems, you drink more.
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Life for young American college graduates is a festive affair. Free of having to support their families, they mostly have gay parties on rooftops where they reflect at length upon their quirky electronic childhoods and sometimes kiss each other on the lips and neck.
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The radio station was playing Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake, a sure sign that things were much worse than they appeared.
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A lot of the ways of advertising a book - the cover, whether somebody sees it on a subway or sees it in a bookstore - those things are going to rapidly diminish as we move to an electronic model.
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Italy has sun and tomatoes, and Russia just has real problems.
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All of my books have an element of a man who is in love with somebody and needs them desperately, not just for procreation but for being able to fully unbosom himself. He only feels comfortable discussing things with women. Which is funny, because 80 percent of readers are women!
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I write almost entirely in bed or on a couch with my feet up on the coffee table. I feel most creative when Im looking out the window, and my bed and couch have nice views of the New York skyline.
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Michigan, with its delicious American name. How lucky one must be to live there.
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I always think that good writers should be growing up on the brink of death - it really lets them see mortality very clearly.
Gary Shteyngart
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The best thing about the iPhone is this that tells me where I am all the time. Theres never a need to feel lost anymore.
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American fiction is good. It would be nice if somebody read it.
Gary Shteyngart
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Asthmatic immigrant learns to breathe by writing.
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In America, the distance between wanting something and having it delivered to your living room is not terribly great.
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