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Past tense offers authority, distance, and present tense offers emotional immediacy.

Tim Winton

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Tim Winton
Age: 64
Born: 1960
Born: August 4
Novelist
Screenwriter
Writer
Perth
Australia
Timothy John Winton
Tense
Distance
Offers
Authority
Emotional
Present
Past
Immediacy

More quotes by Tim Winton

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The health of our seas determines the future of humanity.
Tim Winton
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When I was a girl I had this strong feeling that I didn't belong anywhere,... It was in my head, what I thought and dreamt, what I believed..., that's where I belonged, that was my country.
Tim Winton
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I don't consciously watch and file lived moments for my work. I have a couple of writer friends who do that and it creeps me out, to be honest. I know people think I must do that too, but I don't. But I do have a long memory.
Tim Winton
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I wanted to be a writer all my life. Since I was 10. And then at a certain point I began to assume I was one, which is rich, I know. I didn't meet a writer until I was nearly an adult, so I had no idea what I'd bet the farm on.
Tim Winton
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Yet however comforting and peaceful beach-combing is, it ends up like the sea, as disturbing as it is reassuring. In dark moments I believe that walking on a beach at low tide is to be looking for death, or at least anticipating it. You will only find the dead, the spilled and the cast-off. Things torn free of their life or their place.
Tim Winton
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The night is full of stories. They float up like miasmas, as though the dead leave their dreams in the earth where you bury them, only to have them rise to meet you in sleep. Mostly the scenes are familiar, but sometimes everything is strange, the people unknown.
Tim Winton
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If we love the sea as much as we claim to we'll do everything we possibly can to keep it healthy. Otherwise we might as well take up golf.
Tim Winton
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I don't think it's people's utterances that limit the writing. It's the activity itself. It's actually pretty hard to convey to someone who's not a surfer. The sensation is the thing. And it's tough to describe without resorting to clichés or mystical nonsense.
Tim Winton
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People do change - individuals, families, nations - and the pace of transformation need not be geological.
Tim Winton
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Whatever you believe, you need faith to get through the day.
Tim Winton
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I eat green ants often enough. They are wonderful. The trick is to squash them before you eat them, otherwise they bite your tongue and it ruins the experience.
Tim Winton
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Life is wild by definition. And organic existence is violent. Though I find this hard to accept. And I know it goes against the cultural grain of therapeutic smoothing so dominant in what we like to call 'cultural discourse'.
Tim Winton
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The ocean is a supreme metaphor for change. I expect the unexpected but am never fully prepared.
Tim Winton
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We are all part of that global traffic and I think that the effort to make yourself understood and to be not a problem for anyone or to hide your own particuarly is a mistake. I think people will and do value individuality.
Tim Winton
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We rise to a challenge and set a course. We take a decision. You put your mind to something. Just deciding to do it gets you halfway there. Daring to try.
Tim Winton
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It's funny, but you never really think much about breathing. Until it's all you ever think about.
Tim Winton
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Doing nothing is making certain you lose. Which is just gutless.
Tim Winton
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When you're surfing you're not thinking about where you parked the car or what you're going to do when you grow up or what you're going to buy when you've got lots of money. You know, you're just there. You're in the moment. And I think in a contemporary world, that's a rare privilege.
Tim Winton
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For every moment the sea is peace and relief, there is another when it shivers and stirs to become chaos. It's just as ready to claim as it is to offer.
Tim Winton
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In fiction 'issues' are accidental, sometimes incidental. The place and the people it creates are paramount.
Tim Winton