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I am simply not interested, at this point, in creating narrative scenes between characters.

Lydia Davis

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Lydia Davis
Age: 77
Born: 1947
Born: July 15
Linguist
Novelist
Translator
University Teacher
Writer
Northampton
Massachusetts
Characters
Interested
Scene
Creating
Simply
Point
Character
Scenes
Narrative

More quotes by Lydia Davis

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I think a lot of what goes into writing can be taught - not mixing metaphors, etc.
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Art is not in some far-off place.
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To be simple, I would say a story has to have a bit of narrative, if only she says, and then enough of a creation of a different time and place to transport the reader.
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I never dream in French, but certain French words seem better or more fun than English words - like 'pois chiches' for chick peas!
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There seemed to be three choices: to give up trying to love anyone, to stop being selfish, or to learn to love a person while continuing to be selfish.
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I'm used to rereading e-mails, even, before sending them - a bit compulsive. So this is high speed roller coaster for me!
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When I'm trying a new form- trying to do something I'm not used to doing, which was true of the novel.
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Because I'm not writing all the time (thank goodness), my mind is sometimes pleasantly blank.
Lydia Davis
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As the writer, I may choose to ignore the emotional heart of the matter, and focus on details, and trust that the heart of the matter will be conveyed nevertheless.
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I worked more intensively hour after hour when I was starting out [writing]. More laboriously. I'd say quantity is important as well as quality, and if you're not producing enough, make a schedule and stick to it.
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I looked like a woman in glasses, but I had dreams of leading a very different kind of life, the life of a woman who would not wear glasses, the kind of woman I saw from a distance now and then in a bar.
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I don’t like to hurt people’s feelings, and I don’t like to knock other writers as a matter of principle.
Lydia Davis
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So the question really is, Why doesn't that pain make you say, I won't do it again? When the pain is so bad that you have to say that, but you don't.
Lydia Davis
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I don't pare down much. I write the beginning of a story in a notebook and it comes out very close to what it will be in the end. There is not much deliberateness about it.
Lydia Davis
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I started writing the one-sentence stories when I was translating 'Swann's Way.' There were two reasons. I had almost no time to do my own writing, but didn't want to stop. And it was a reaction to Proust's very long sentences.
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No one is calling me. I can’t check the answering machine because I have been here all this time. If I go out, someone may call while I’m out. Then I can check the answering machine when I come back in.
Lydia Davis
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I don't feel I have to struggle against allegory. I let the readers do the interpreting.
Lydia Davis
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If I was writing about an academic or a more difficult person, I would use the Latinate vocabulary more, but I do think Anglo-saxon is the language of emotion.
Lydia Davis
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I am basically the sort of person who has stage-fright teaching. I kind of creep into a classroom. I'm not an anecdote-teller, either, although I often wish I were.
Lydia Davis
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The moment when a limit is reached, when there is nothing ahead but darkness: something comes in to help that is not real. Another way all this is like madness: a mad person not helped out of his trouble by anything real begins to trust what is not real because it helps him and he needs it because real things continue not to help him.
Lydia Davis