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America beats on you so hard the whole time. You are constantly being pummeled by other people's rights and their sense of patriotism.

Richard Ford

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Richard Ford
Age: 80
Born: 1944
Born: February 16
Novelist
Writer
Jackson
Mississippi
America
Whole
Hard
Pummeled
Time
Patriotism
People
Beats
Constantly
Rights
Sense

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And I think that in myself (and perhaps evident in what I write) fear of loss and the corresponding instinct to protect myself against loss are potent forces.
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I have a theory... that someplace at the heart of most compelling stories is something that doesn't make sense.
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I didn't feel up to writing about 9/11. If I were to write about it, it would take me years.
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In order to write novels for a living - it's not pathological, but I do think and worry and brood and fidget about stuff that I'm working on.
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Life's passed along to us empty. We have to make up the happiness part.
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Literature should not be exclusive, it should be inclusive. My general view is that you can't, based on your own experience, project what a book will do for someone else. That's why I don't review books.
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Love isn’t a thing, after all, but an endless series of single acts.
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Maturity, as I conceived it, was recognizing what was bad or peculiar in life, admitting it has to stay that way, and going ahead with the best of things.
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The world is a more engaging and less dramatic place than writers ever give it credit for being
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I went to college to study hospitality. I quickly got out of that and realized that what I liked to do was write.
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I grew up in Mississippi being told it was a great place, but not feeling that. When I finally began reading seriously, literature showed me something about where I was from which was worthwhile.
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Find what causes a commotion in your heart. Find a way to write about that
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Someone ... tell us what's important, because we no longer know.
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Most things don't stay the way they are very long.
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For a time after my divorce everything began to seem profoundly ironic to me. I found myself thinking of other peoples' worries as sources of amusement and private derision which I thought about at night to make myself feel better.
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The thing about being a writer is that you never have to ask, 'Am I doing something that's worthwhile?' Because even if you fail at it, you know that it's worth doing.
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With imagination, you can put something where nothing was.
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