78 Quotes by Dana Spiotta

I always think the novelist should go to the culture's dark places and poke around. Pose a lot of hard questions.

I think there's a false division people sometimes make in describing literary novels, where there are people who write systems novels, or novels of ideas, and there are people who write about emotional things in which the movement is character driven. But no good novels are divisible in that way.

There are lots of authentic, moving characters in so-called systems novels, just as there are certainly deep structural ideas in some character-driven novels.

The issue isn’t, Am I good enough? No. The issue is, Do I not have any other choice? Will and desire don’t matter. Ability doesn’t matter. Need is the only thing that matters.

The idea that you can live off the grid and just do your own thing is a very American idea – that you should be able to do your own thing, if you want to, if you’re willing to pay the price for it. I think the price has gotten higher and higher.

My husband is a musician. He cooks and he’s a chef but he also, he makes basement recordings. So many people in my life make basement recordings, so I feel very lucky, I’m surrounded by very creative people.

I think there’s a false division people sometimes make in describing literary novels, where there are people who write systems novels, or novels of ideas, and there are people who write about emotional things in which the movement is character driven. But no good novels are divisible in that way.

Memory is not particularly linear – it is associative, repetitive, subjective and porous. But the writer needs to convey disorder and dysfunction without making the novel itself disorderly or dysfunctional.

I don’t feel sentimental about the past, but I can’t help noticing how hard it has become to keep a grip on anything. Maybe it’s the totalizing impact of corporate culture, maybe it’s the atomizing impact of technology.