Ann Beattie
Ann Beattie
Ann Beattieis an American novelist and short story writer. She has received an award for excellence from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters and the PEN/Malamud Award for excellence in the short story form. Her work has been compared to that of Alice Adams, J.D. Salinger, John Cheever, and John Updike. She holds an undergraduate degree from American University and a master's degree from the University of Connecticut...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth8 September 1947
CountryUnited States of America
Ann Beattie quotes about
I don't even correct people when they mispronounce my name now.
When I was teaching at Harvard in the 1970s, I went to Project Incorporated in Cambridge and took photography classes. I didn't even know how to aim the camera in those days.
It's gratifying that it does; I love to give readings.
Falling in Place was meant to be very much rooted in a place and time, and music was a part of that.
What will happen can't be stopped. Aim for Grace.
It's interesting, though, that in daily life, I think of myself as being relatively unobservant.
It's not about having things figured out, or about communicating with other people, trying to make them understand what you understand. It's about a chicken dinner at a drive-in. A soft pillow. Things that don't need explaining.
I could name a few songs and say exactly what summer they came out and what boy I thought I was in love with when I was fourteen years old, but I think that music used to be really more a part of the culture when people went out dancing in a different way than they do now.
While I would agree that I write about serious subjects, and that they're not necessarily the most pleasant subjects or even the most pleasant people, as a writer I just think about the humorous aspects of these things - that's what keeps me going when I'm writing a story.
Any life will seem dramatic if you omit mention of most of it.
I like a lot of Margaret Atwood, I like much of Alice Munro. Again, if you were to ask me about male writers, there's often a novel I admire, but not all of their works.
I must say also that it's never worked to my disadvantage that I have long, blond hair.
The admiration of another writer’s work is almost in inverse proportion to similarities in style.
Italics provide a wonderful advantage: you see, right away, that the words are in a rush. When something exists at a slant, you can't help but consider irony.