Novelists From The United States

"I think labels are generally used to benefit those who invented them, and those who invent them tend not to be those upon whom they are foisted. That said, labels can be tools of empowerment or marginalization, depending on who is using them and why…"

"As a bisexual woman (who, as it happens, is faithfully married to a man and therefore living a “straight” life) I feel it is important to include homosexual or bisexual characters in my work. I am living proof that such things are not “choices,” but innate…"

"There are writers in commercial women’s fiction who get really worked up, and they blog about [the label] and rail against the establishment. I can empathize and understand that frustration, but at the same time, it’s a waste of energy. I look at what the readers and writers of the romance genre have done in creating a parallel universe where they sell millions of books to readers who know these writers are good. They don’t need the stamp of approval. And what I love about my readers is that they are far more sophisticated, in my opinion, than most literary critics, and far less insecure. At the end of the day, people are reading my books and communicating directly with me, thanks to technology."

"Never sat down and thought: “I’m going to create a new genre.” I just sat down and wrote a book that I wanted to read but couldn’t find. In retrospect, I don’t think it’s a new genre; it’s just a novel. There’s an unfortunate tendency in the publishing industry to view ethnicity as a genre and only for certain people. So if you are a minority, your race or ethnicity becomes your genre. Or if you are a woman, your sex becomes your genre. “Women’s fiction”: What does that even mean? Would we ever dare say “commercial men’s fiction”? I think these are marketing terms."

"The biggest driving force in my life has been justice — and by that I don’t mean revenge. I mean fairness for all kinds of people. I think it comes in part from being the daughter of an immigrant who was grossly underestimated for most of his career and life, and the sort of despair you feel watching that happen, the sense that things aren’t fair from a very early age…"

"[Asked if she has any favorite Mississippi or Louisiana authors to recommend) There are so many: Ernest Gaines, Natasha Trethewey, Donna Tartt, Richard Wright, Margaret Walker and Robert Olen Butler are just a few I love."

"Something I think you’re very conscious of growing up in the South is people who speak correctly and people who don’t…George Orwell said, ‘Englishmen are all branded on the tongue.’ It’s the same for southerners. I grew up around people who had wonderful, mellifluous voices; there’s also that twangy cracker accent. And then you were also aware of black English…"

"As a writer, I think I’m more an eye than an ear — the world comes mainly in for me at the eye. So I’m glad the visuals came through for you. As I’m writing my books, I really do see them almost literally — I experience scenes almost as an onlooker, watching from the outside."

"This is something that the novel does better than any other art form: reproducing the inner life and the inner experience of another person, particularly extreme forms of consciousness like grief, dreams, drunkenness, spiritual revelations, even insanity. Unlike movies, where we’re always onlookers, in novels we have the experience of being someone else: knowing another person’s soul from the inside. No other art form does that. And I like dealing with particularly intense inner experiences because I think that in many ways, this is what the novel does best."

"I don’t think it’s a good idea for a writer to psychoanalyze herself or try to explain why she writes what she writes—it’s a reductive way of looking at oneself and one’s work. Readers really participate in the writing of a book. As a writer I’m giving the reader signs to help create the story with me. The reader is bringing his or her own memories, intelligence, preconceptions, prejudices, likes, dislikes. So the characters in your copy of the book are going to look and sound different than in mine. I have my own ideas, but once the book is out there it’s not really mine anymore, and my own idea isn’t any more valid than yours. And then I begin the long process of disengaging."

"I’m a bit of a lone wolf…I don’t give interviews or do publicity unless I have a book out—too distracting. My desk is where the real work happens."

"I grew up reading a lot of young adult novels. And being an author and speaker and going into middle schools and high schools, I was seeing a lot of the same books that I read, and they followed a similar theme and that's a theme I like to call the three B's: It was always about barrios, borders or bodegas. And I wanted to present a different type of life — a life that truly goes on that we don't always see in the mainstream media."

"I relished the fact that I was a fourth-generation Californian, but not looking like the stereotypical blond beach girl…I always felt like an outsider."

"The most authentic me would, again, be the voice behind the short stories and poetry. The least “me” would be the script writer and the author of some magazine pieces I’ve written that have been, basically, paycheck pieces. After so many rewrites and editorial suggestions (i.e. changes) prompted by NY-based mainstream magazine editors whom I’ve never met, my voice definitely gets lost along the way."

"I understand that many people believe that writers write from their heart or from their soul. I write from the nagging pit of my gut, to make the stomachache go away."

"Esmeralda Santiago has defined the literature of the Puerto Rican diaspora."

"(What books or authors have most inspired you? What books did you read while working on Ordinary Girls?) JD: Definitely Esmeralda Santiago’s When I Was Puerto Rican. It was one of the very first times I saw myself in a book written in English. Before then, to me, it seemed like Puerto Ricans didn’t even exist in American publishing. As a kid, I went to the library and everything the librarian handed me were books written by white people about white people — mostly by white men. When I Was Puerto Rican still feels relevant and iconic for me."

"What doesn't kill you, makes you fat."

"I wondered if men ever talked like this, if their sorrows ever spilled into these secret cadences."

"For me, the person I was becoming when we left was erased, and another one was created."

"Through her work, she has shown a remarkable commitment to maintaining the stories of Puerto Rico in boricua hands. “If we preserve our stories, then they belong to us,” she says."

"Edmaris Carazo, who the author says is one of her favorite talents from Puerto Rico at the moment...For Santiago, the impetus to develop a new tradition of Puerto Rican authors comes from her beginnings in literature, back in her childhood when she spent time in the backyard of a family member’s house in el campo. There, she listened to relatives tell trovas – oral tradition in rhyme. She also credits her dad’s love for poetry and Puerto Rican authors Julia de Burgos, Manuel Alonso, and Luis Palés Matos with sparking her interest."

"“I didn’t leave Puerto Rico. A mí me sacaron,” she tells me, referring to her exodus from Puerto Rico as a girl from San Juan. “I think nobody would prefer to leave that way.”"

"“I learned you pay for your happiness. That's why I don't expect to be happy all the time. I'd rather be surprised by one moment every so often to remind me that joy is possible, even if I have to pay for it later.”"

"How can you know what you're capable of if you don't embrace the unknown?"

"I thought, 'I have been through this process before’…When I was 13 years old I came from Puerto Rico to the United States not knowing any English. What I did at that time was I went to the public library, and I would go to the children’s book section where there would be alphabet books and everything would be illustrated. So it was very easy to connect the words to the images. I said, ‘I’m just going to do the same thing. If I did it once before, I can do it again.’"

"At a certain point, I gave up on the idea that I’m not enough for other people…You are enough for you if you believe that you are enough for you. Whatever they say — you’re not Latina enough, or feminine enough or smart enough, you know ... just say ‘fuck you.’ That’s their problem."

"My own ancestors. I come from poor, landless peasants who left no records. And so I began to read the story of Puerto Rico, and the more I read the story the more I realized I would never find my own ancestors, but I could make my imaginary ancestors. And so the book emerges as a result of my trying to create them, to create the people that might have been."

"My natural default-setting is the certainty that situations like this are really all about me, about my hungriness and my fatigue and my desire to just get home, and it's going to seem, for all the world, like everybody else is just in my way, and who are all these people in my way?"

"The first day in the desert felt like the longest day Salva had ever lived through. The sun was relentless and eternal: …show more content. Even breathing became an effort: Every breath Salva took seemed to drain strength rather than restore it."

"Stands of stunted trees. There was little to eat: a few fruits here and there, always either unripe or worm-rotten. Salva’s peanuts were gone by the end of the third day. After about a week, they were joined by more people—another group of Dinka and several members of a tribe called the Jur-chol. Men and women, boys and girls, old and young, walking, walking. . . . Walking to nowhere. Salva had never been so hungry. He stumbled along, somehow moving one foot ahead of the other, not noticing the ground he walked on or the forest around him or the light in the sky. Nothing was real except his hunger, once a hollow in his stomach but now a deep buzzing pain in every part of him. Usually he walked among the Dinka, but today, shuffling along in a daze, he found he had fallen a little behind. Walking next to him was a young man from the Jur-chol. Salva didn’t"

"Yes, there it is again. Come!” Buksa began walking very quickly. Salva struggled to keep up. Twice Buksa paused to listen, then kept going even faster. “What—” Salva started to ask. Buksa stopped abruptly in front of a very large tree. “Yes!” he said. “Now go call the others!” By now Salva had caught the feeling of excitement. “But what shall I tell them?” “The bird. The one I was listening to. He led me right here.” Buksa’s smile was even bigger now. “You see that?” He pointed up at the branches of the tree. “Beehive. A fine, large one.” Salva hurried off to call the rest of the group. He had heard of this, that the Jur-chol could follow the call of the bird called the honey guide! But he had never seen it done before. Honey! This night, they would feast."

"There was a big lake three days’ walk from Nya’s village. Every year when the rains stopped and the pond near the village dried up, Nya’s family moved from their home to a camp near the big lake. Nya’s family did not live by the lake all year round because of the fighting. Her tribe, the Nuer, often fought with the rival Dinka tribe over the land surrounding the lake. Men and boys were hurt and even killed when the two groups clashed. So Nya and the rest of her village lived at the lake only during the five months of the dry season, when both tribes were so busy struggling for survival that the fighting occurred far less often."

"know much about him, except that his name was Buksa. As they walked along, Buksa slowed down. Salva wondered sluggishly if they shouldn’t try to keep up a bit better. Just then Buksa stopped walking. Salva stopped, too. But he was too weak and hungry to ask why they were standing still. Buksa cocked his head and furrowed his brow, listening. They stood motionless for several moments. Salva could hear the noise of the rest of the group ahead of them, a few faint voices, birds calling somewhere in the trees. . . . He strained his ears. What was it? Jet planes? Bombs? Was the gunfire getting closer, instead of farther away? Salva’s fear began to grow until it was even stronger than his hunger. Then— “Ah.” A slow smile spread over Buksa’s face. “There. You hear?” Salva frowned and shook his head."

"And she found her voice. "Thank you," she said, and looked up at him bravely. "Thank you for bringing the water."

"Stay calm when things are hard or not going right with you. You will get through it when you persevere instead of quitting. Quitting leads to much less happiness in life than perseverance and hope."

"And one day at a time, the group made its way to Kenya. More than twelve hundred boys arrived safely. It took them a year and a half."

"To young people, I would like to say: Stay calm when things are hard or not going right with you. You will get through it when you persevere instead of quitting. Quitting leads to much less happiness in life than perseverance and hope. Salva Dut Rochester, New York 2010"

"They patched the bag again. The drilling went on."

"The bag sprang a leak. The leak had to be patched. The patch sprang a leak. The crew patched the patch. Then the bag sprang another leak. The drilling could not go on."

"Her sickness came from the water,” the nurse explained. “She should drink only good clean water. If the water is dirty, you should boil it for a count of two hundred before she drinks"

"Stay calm when things are hard or not going right with you. You will get through it when you persevere instead of quitting."

"Salva shouldered his way through the crowd until he was standing in front of the list. He raised his head slowly and began reading through the names. There it was. Salva Dut—Rochester, New York. Salva was going to New York. He was going to America!"

"More than twelve hundred boys arrived safely. It took them a year and a half."

"How could memories feel so close and so far away at the same time?"

"Quitting leads to much less happiness in life than perseverance and hope."

"He was floating with his head down, blood streaming from a bullet hole in the back of his neck."

"If he were older and stronger, would he have given water to those men? Or would he, like most of the group, have kept his water for himself?"

"Reading for writers is like training for athletes."

"One step at a time, one day at a time, just today, just this day to get through."