Chang-Rae Lee
Chang-Rae Lee
Chang-rae Leeis a Korean American novelist and a professor of creative writing at Stanford University,. He was previously Professor of Creative Writing at Princeton and director of Princeton's Program in Creative Writing...
NationalitySouth Korean
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth29 July 1965
family few follows good hours kids mornings night work
My writing day follows my family's day. I get a good few hours in the mornings when the kids are out of the house. And I don't work at night any more. I like to see my family.
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Before I start my work in the morning, I need to have quickly browsed the entire paper, noting articles that I want to read during lunch.
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After college, I was living in New York and wrote furiously, a huge novel that I knew was a failure. I hoped that the book would work, but to be honest, I think I knew it would never work, even as I was finishing it.
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We grow up with this idea that we're all individual agents. We work, make our money, have our place to live and our satellite TV. But whether you like it or not, you need family or community.
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I didn't leave Wall Street because the work was against my nature - I do have a pretty good head for numbers. I left because I had this love for writing.
poetry
I think book clubs should read more contemporary poetry.
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We arrived the way most emigrant families did. My father came first, and the rest of us - my mother, my sister and me - followed a year later.
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Unlike F. Scott Fitzgerald and Tom Wolfe, I don't like proper dress while working. I like writing in pajama-like clothing, which eases and relaxes me and allows me to connect with the decidedly improper.
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I suppose people might consider me a 'loose' reader, as I seem willing to read anything of quality thinking and prose.
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Like most people, I'm fascinated by characters who are completely flawed personalities, riven by anguish and doubt, and are psychologically suspect.
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What's fun about a dystopian novel is that we can enjoy and be entertained. But that world is only slightly different, right? It's familiar enough to be recognizable, and skewed enough to give us pause.
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We read and remember certain writers because they offer distinctive voices and perspectives, because they've given themselves over completely and passionately to their obsessions while vigorously ignoring everything else.
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We know the point of the 2010 Census is to count us, one by one, to tally every last resident, but the massive project of course has more prying, if limited, interests.
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My parents - my mother, particularly - were very focused on our succeeding. I loved my parents, and was very grateful to them for everything, and I didn't want to disappoint them.