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I have a theory... that someplace at the heart of most compelling stories is something that doesn't make sense.

Richard Ford

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Richard Ford
Age: 80
Born: 1944
Born: February 16
Novelist
Writer
Jackson
Mississippi
Doesn
Stories
Heart
Something
Make
Someplace
Compelling
Theory
Sense

More quotes by Richard Ford

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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.
Richard Ford
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At heart, of course, a story itself is consolation's instrument.
Richard Ford
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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.
Richard Ford
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For, how else to seize such an instant? How to shout out into the empty air just the right words, and on cue? Frame a moment to last a lifetime?
Richard Ford
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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.
Richard Ford
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To write you had to read so I backed into reading.
Richard Ford
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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.
Richard Ford
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I don't want to be taken to Bhutan and smell the flowers. I want to be told something I couldn't have been told any other way.
Richard Ford
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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.
Richard Ford
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Maybe I'm a serial regional writer. First here, then there, across the map.
Richard Ford
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Reading is probably what leads most writers to writing.
Richard Ford
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I'm intrigued by how ordinary behavior exists so close beside its opposite.
Richard Ford
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Most things don't stay the way they are for very long. I take nothing for granted and try to be ready for the change that's soon to come.
Richard Ford
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Americans don't have saner gun laws because most Americans, including those citizens who puzzle over better angels, don't want saner gun laws.
Richard Ford
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The ways in which things are superficially similar but also distinct is interesting to me.
Richard Ford
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Very early you come to the realization that nothing will ever take you away from yourself.
Richard Ford
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I wouldn't be a very good writer if someone hadn't taught me how to read.
Richard Ford
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Find what causes a commotion in your heart. Find a way to write about that
Richard Ford
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At the exact moment any decision seems to be being made, it's usually long after the real decision was actually made--like light we see emitted from stars.
Richard Ford
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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.
Richard Ford