250 Quotes by Richard Ford

Married life requires shared mystery even when all the facts are known.

Maturity, as I conceived it, was recognizing what was bad or peculiar in life, admitting it has to stay that way, and going ahead with the best of things.

I haven't scoured Dixie out of my voice. But I don't think that the books that I have written... have really in any way been Southern in character.

In order to write novels for a living - it's not pathological, but I do think and worry and brood and fidget about stuff that I'm working on.

Marry somebody you love and who thinks you being a writer's a good idea.

I didn't read a serious book until I was 19.

The art of living your life has a lot to do with getting over loss. The less the past haunts you, the better.

You can't write ... on the strength of influence. You can only write a good story or a good novel by yourself.

It's interesting to leave a place, interesting even to think about it. Leaving reminds us of what we can part with and what we can't, then offers us something new to look forward to, to dream about.