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I think because I try to keep things as real as I can, or I try to start from a place of reality, I almost don't have the imagination to write a book that's not set where I am.

Maria Semple

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Maria Semple
Age: 60
Born: 1964
Born: May 21
Novelist
Screenwriter
Television Producer
Writer
Santa Monica
California
Maria Keogh Semple
Book
Real
Imagination
Writing
Almost
Trying
Start
Things
Write
Think
Keep
Thinking
Place
Reality

More quotes by Maria Semple

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My day is not that fun-filled or that filled usually with complications.
Maria Semple
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You bet your bindi that’s how big I want it.
Maria Semple
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I felt so full of love for everything. But at the same time, I felt so hung out there to dry, like nobody could ever understand. I felt so alone in this world, and so loved at the same time.
Maria Semple
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After decades spent in rewrite rooms surrounded by other shouting writers, I discovered that I work best alone. I like being in charge of my time, working out the problems according to my own rhythms and being able to nap. That's a big one, the napping on demand!
Maria Semple
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I'm not too good when exposed to people
Maria Semple
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I got a huge knot in my stomach because if Antarctica could talk, it would be saying only one thing: you don't belong here. (277)
Maria Semple
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Unfortunately Seattle is my muse, for the better or worse of Seattle - I'm not sure.
Maria Semple
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Breezy, sophisticated, hilarious, rude and aching with sweetness: LOVE, NINA might be the most charming book I've ever read.
Maria Semple
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I can pinpoint that as the single happiest moment of my life, because I realized then that Mom would always have my back. It made me feel giant. I raced back down the concrete ramp, faster than I ever had before, so fast I should have fallen, but I didn't fall, because Mom was in the world.
Maria Semple
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The sooner you learn it's on you to make life interesting, the better off you'll be.
Maria Semple
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Maggie Shipstead's prose is so graceful and muscular, so dazzling, so sure-handed and fearless, that at times I had to remind myself to breathe. Astonish Me is a treasure of small surprises.
Maria Semple
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I think thats the most important job of a novelist - to bring authority to their writing.
Maria Semple
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Its like a hypnotist put everyone from Seattle into a collective trance. You are getting sleepy, when you wake up you will want to live only in a Craftsman house, the year won't matter to you, all that will matter is that the walls will be thick, the windows tiny, the rooms dark, the ceilings low, and it will be poorly situated on the lot.
Maria Semple
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Hovering over me was the Chihuly chandelier. Chihulys are the pigeons of Seattle. They're everywhere and even if they don't get in your way, you can't help but build up a kind of antipathy toward them.
Maria Semple
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I'd say I never considered myself a great architect. I'm more of a creative problem solver with good taste and a soft spot for logistical nightmares.
Maria Semple
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I think one of the good things about writing novels is that you always start from scratch.
Maria Semple
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Your mission statement says Galer Street is based on global connectitude. (You people don't just think outside the box, you think outside the dictionary!)
Maria Semple
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I spend my whole life trying to put up a front to prevent people from seeing certain parts of me. Weirdly, when I go to write, I feel like I have to expose it, almost compulsively.
Maria Semple
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You come out into the world after a season of TV and you're just swearing and saying mean things to people and they're looking at you like, Who are you? And oh yeah, you think, I have to reacclimate to the way people genuinely treat each other.
Maria Semple
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Mad About You fit my sensibility the most of any show that I worked on, and as a result, it was really fun. It felt like a very natural fit.
Maria Semple