412 Quotes by Colson Whitehead

Some people don't like my fiction, because they prefer the nonfiction. But moving around keeps the work fresh for me and, hopefully, for my one or two readers who follow me from book to book!

I always try to mix it up with each book - changing tone, changing style keeps the work very vital for me.

For me, choosing between fiction and nonfiction is really only about picking the right tool for the job.

Schools don't teach American history that well, especially a lot of black American history.

My mom's mother was from Virginia, but I don't feel much of a tie. I'm very much anti-South for many, many reasons. Whenever I go down there, people are always looking at me funny, you know.

Zombies are a great rhetorical prop to talk about people and paranoia, and they are a good vehicle for my misanthropy.

Part of any book is establishing the rules at the end of the world. My first book, 'The Intuitionist,' takes place in an alternative world where elevator inspectors are important, so you have to establish rules, and part of that is, How do people talk? How do they behave?

People don't like it when you compare the miracle of childbirth to writing a book, but I think there is some overlap in the two because they are both pure agony.

A lot of my books have started with an abstract premise.