#read

I had no books at home. I started to frequent a public library in Lisbon. It was there, with no help except curiosity and the will to learn, that my taste for reading developed and was refined. ↗

— Jose Saramago

#curiosity #developed #except #frequent #had

The wisest man I ever knew in my whole life could not read or write. ↗

— Jose Saramago

#ever #i #knew #life #man

The U.S. needs to control the Middle East, the gateway to Asia. It already has military installations in Uzbekistan. ↗

— Jose Saramago

#asia #control #east #gateway #installations

One can't write for all readers. A poet cannot write for people who don't like poetry. ↗

— Nathalie Sarraute

#like #people #poet #poetry #readers

Man is not the sum of what he has already, but rather the sum of what he does not yet have, of what he could have. ↗

— Jean-Paul Sartre

#could #does #man #rather #sum

Reading is a form of prayer, a guided meditation that briefly makes us believe we're someone else, disrupting the delusion that we're permanent and at the center of the universe. Suddenly (we're saved!) other people are real again, and we're fond of them. ↗

— George Saunders

#believe #briefly #center #delusion #else

To me, the writer's main job is to just make the story unscroll in such a way that the reader is snared - she's right there, seeing things happen and caring about them. And if you dedicate yourself to this job, the meanings more or less take care of themselves. That's the theory, anyway. ↗

— George Saunders

#anyway #care #caring #dedicate #happen

Early on, a story's meaning and rationale seem pretty obvious, but then, as I write it, I realize that I know the meaning/rationale too well, which means that the reader will also know it - and so things have to be ramped up. ↗

— George Saunders

#early #i #i write #know #meaning

For me, the game would be to assume a very intelligent reader who can extrapolate a lot from a little. And that's become my definition of art; to get that pitch just right, where I can put a hint on page three, and the reader's ears go up a bit, as opposed to dropping it all on the first page. ↗

— George Saunders

#assume #become #bit #definition #dropping

I tend to foster drama via bleakness. If I want the reader to feel sympathy for a character, I cleave the character in half, on his birthday. And then it starts raining. And he's made of sugar. ↗

— George Saunders

#character #drama #feel #foster #half