Quote

I read 'The Great Gatsby' in high school and was hypnotized by the beauty of the sentences and moved by the story about the irrevocability of lost love.

Tom Perrotta

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Tom Perrotta
Age: 63
Born: 1961
Born: August 13
Novelist
Screenwriter
Writer
Garwood
New Jersey
Great
Moved
Love
Beauty
High
Story
Read
Lost
Hypnotized
Stories
Gatsby
School
Sentences

More quotes by Tom Perrotta

Image
Jill felt an emptiness open inside of her as she lifted her arm, a sense that something vital was being subtracted from her life. It was always like that when somebody you cared about went away, even when you knew it was inevitable, and it probably wasn't your fault.
Tom Perrotta
Image
It felt good, the whole family together on a sunny morning in a wholesome environment. If it hadn't been for the warshiping God part, he would have happily attended church on a regular basis.
Tom Perrotta
Image
I'm not sure that it's possible to write a novel about people who don't transgress or stumble, people who don't surprise themselves with the things they do, people who can explain all their actions with perfect logical consistency. At least it's not possible for me to write that sort of novel.
Tom Perrotta
Image
I don't really distinguish between sympathy and honesty when I'm writing. The two go together - I'm interested in inhabiting my characters, seeing the world through their eyes.
Tom Perrotta
Image
I've been a little bit obsessed with religion, without being a religious person, for about a decade.
Tom Perrotta
Image
It just took some people a little longer than others to realize how few words they needed to get by, how much of life they could negotiate in silence.
Tom Perrotta
Image
To this day, she’s still sad. Because there’s not some finite amount of pain inside us. Our bodies and minds just keep manufacturing more of it. I’m just saying that I took the pain that was inside of her at that moment and made it my own. And it didn’t hurt me at all.
Tom Perrotta
Image
I find that even small changes sometimes jog you out of a mental rut.
Tom Perrotta
Image
I know very few writers who outline fully before they start. It just doesn't seem possible to do, because so many things don't come out until you're absolutely knee-deep in the world.
Tom Perrotta
Image
My novels are certainly more exciting than my own life.
Tom Perrotta
Image
My wife and I left New York when she got pregnant - we just thought it would be really hard to stay in the city.
Tom Perrotta
Image
It just so happened that for most of my life I've lived in the suburbs.
Tom Perrotta
Image
I was an English major in college, I went to a creative-writing program, and all my life, I really read and thought about fiction as a craft and an art form. I feel like I know a lot about it, and can trust my instincts.
Tom Perrotta
Image
I write about kids growing up, I write a lot about schools and parents, and all of my experiences with those things have been suburban experiences.
Tom Perrotta
Image
They both seemed to understand that describing it was beyond their powers, the gratitude that spreads through your body when a burden gets lifted, and the sense of homecoming that follows, when you suddenly remember what it feels like to be yourself.
Tom Perrotta
Image
Maybe that's what we look for in the people we love, the spark of unhappiness we think we know how to extinguish.
Tom Perrotta
Image
I was writing very early, like I was involved in our high school literary magazine, which was called 'Pariah.' The football team was the Bears, and the literary magazine was 'Pariah.' It was great. It was definitely a real sub-culture. But I wrote stories for them.
Tom Perrotta
Image
Nothing beats novel writing because it's complete expression of you. You just control everything. Not even a movie director has that level of control.
Tom Perrotta
Image
As for writing about temptation, there's no drama without temptation, and no novel without drama.
Tom Perrotta
Image
After all, what was adult life but one moment of weakness piled on top of another? Most people just fell in line like obedient little children, doing exactly what society expected of them at any given moment, all the while pretending that they’d actually made some sort of choice.
Tom Perrotta