Will Strauss
Will Strauss
glad liked
Usually, as a fiction writer, you get e-mails saying, 'I liked your book,' or 'I didn't like it.' You don't get something saying, 'I'm really glad this is in the world.'
finding harder learning mass memoir people ready saw seeing structure yes
What makes writing a memoir difficult is harder to quantify. Is it learning to know when you're ready to talk about something? Is it seeing the structure in a lumpen mass of fact? Is it finding out what you were really like as other people saw you? Yes to each.
awkward cracks old-friendship
The cracks in old friendships are measured in awkward pauses.
kindness self special
Everybody wants life to speak to them with special kindness. Every personal story begs to be steered toward reverie, toward some relief from unpleasant truths: That you are a self, that beyond anything else you want the best for that self. That, if it is to be you or someone else, you need it to be you, no matter what.
senior mom kissing
I'd violated the primary rule of junior and senior high-- don't get people talking about you too much. This was wearing the brightest shirt on the playground. This was Mom giving you a kiss in the lobby.
aspiring divert enormous people prey publishing
There is an enormous shadow industry of scammers and amateurs who prey on aspiring writers, who divert people from the real publishing industry into this shadow world of vanity publishing and fee-charging agents.
time
When I was in college, my whole goal was to write for the 'Village Voice,' and I think I was doing that by the time I was twenty-one or twenty, so everything else has kind of been gravy, you know?
aware claim french-scientist men minds myths operate therefore
I therefore claim to show, not how men think in myths, but how myths operate in men's minds without their being aware of the fact.
change rapidly responsibility review
When things change very rapidly we have a fiduciary responsibility to review what are the circumstances.