Latest Curtis Sittenfeld Quotes from Interviews

Quotes about:

• I've had people say very dismissive things about my books, but I also feel like I probably have more readers because I'm a woman. I mean, more readers are women and more people who buy books are women, so I don't feel like it's a total disadvantage to be a female writer.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Book, Mean, People

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• I liked the idea of giving Eligible a feminist flavor. While I do think that in Pride and Prejudice, Liz Bennet is very bold, she is also very restricted in terms of what's appropriate for her to do and the ways it's appropriate for her to behave. One of the differences between Pride and Prejudice and Eligible is that my female characters take more initiative in their romantic lives.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Character, Pride, Thinking

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• I think it's significantly easier to be a female writer today than in the early 1800's. That said, it's hard to imagine almost anyone who knows anything about publishing disagreeing with the statement that women writers today are often taken much less seriously than men writers. But it's hard to quantify, and even define, what being taken seriously means.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Taken, Mean, Men

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• Even more than getting compliments on social media, what I love is when some random stranger says something very funny or insightful about my books, often in 140 characters or less! It's a very casual, low-stakes, non-burdensome way of connecting that I think is fun for both the writer and the reader. And there are a lot of clever people out there who have no connection to publishing.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Clever, Fun, Book

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• The best part of being a writer for me is immersing myself in a fictional world, which is the opposite of being on social media. At the same time, if no one ever read my work, if I was writing solely for myself, I bet it would be lonely and a lot less fun.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Lonely, Fun, Writing

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• Obviously the bar is much higher now for a behavior to be scandalous. Social media has really changed the way people live. It's not a new impulse; it's just being enacted in a new way.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  People, Social Media, Behavior

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• I feel like people who criticize authors for being self-promotional fail to recognize that a lot of times their ability to continue writing hinges on sales and recognition. Some of it is for fun, some of it is for ego, but a lot of it is just writers trying to ensure longevity to their career.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Fun, Writing, People

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• I think there is still pressure to marry. I think there is still pressure to have children. If you're middle or upper class, those pressures exist at a later age now.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Children, Thinking, Age

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• I'm not afraid of writing about sensitive subjects, but I want to be careful how I do so and I know not all readers will think I have been, of course.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Writing, Thinking, Sensitive

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• I thought, if I write a book that is not a retelling of Pride and Prejudice, it's not going to mean that I will not get any criticism. I might as well write the book that I want to write.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Book, Writing, Mean

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• I don't know what it is about human beings but most of us really like reading about or observing sexual tension and romance. It's just so much fun. I don't know if there is some Darwinian thing in us that really responds to that, but I think the most memorable scenes to me in books and movies are the ones where a couple is about to kiss.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Couple, Fun, Reading

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• It's different to read a book for pleasure than to read it analytically. In the past, I'd read Pride and Prejudice for pleasure. This time, I was really looking at the structure, the order of events, how the characters interact with each other and how the book is paced.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Book, Character, Pride

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• I feel that Pride and Prejudice is an incredibly well constructed novel on every level. The dialogue is great. The character development is great. The plotting is great. The pacing is great. The language is great.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Character, Pride, Prejudice

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• I was 16 years old, attending boarding school, and I loved Pride and Prejudice. From the opening pages, I loved it. And I will say in my class, not one but two boys told me that I reminded them of Lizzy Bennet. I didn't realize it at the time but this was the nicest thing that any male would ever say to me. This was as good as it got.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  School, Pride, Boys

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• Of course a magazine is usually more interesting than a conversation, because so much more time and preparation has gone into it.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Interesting, Preparation, Gone

  Source: therumpus.net

• I just like to inhabit a character really deeply.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Character, Really Deep

  Source: therumpus.net

• If I'm at somebody's house and they have magazines on the table and people are chatting, I feel almost a physical urge to start reading the magazines instead of talking to people.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Reading, Talking, People

  Source: therumpus.net

• I guess because twins have this mystique, and triplets - I think the normal sibling connection potentially can be very powerful, and there's this idea that it's even more powerful. It really is, not just someone like me, but another version of me.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Powerful, Sibling, Thinking

  Source: therumpus.net

• In life we're most hell-bent on proving things that we're not really sure are true.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Hell, Bent, Prove

  Source: therumpus.net

• I like it when characters are some combination of appealing and maybe flawed or self-interested. I think in terms of scenes, and what I want a scene to achieve, and I think that the psychological realism arises from that.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Character, Thinking, Self

  Source: therumpus.net

• I think I would have liked to have been a twin... Sometimes my sisters and I get mistaken for twins, and I always take it as a compliment.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Thinking, Twins, Sometimes

  Source: therumpus.net

• I think I write what's interesting to me, and so if I'm reading I like to have a very thorough idea of a character in a book that's by someone else.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Book, Reading, Writing

  Source: therumpus.net

• I feel like as I've gotten older I've unfortunately come to the decision that a lot of people who seem normal and boring maybe are normal and boring.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  People, Decision, Normal

  Source: therumpus.net

• I don't think that I would ever, while writing, think to myself, "I need a little more psychological realism."

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Writing, Thinking, Needs

  Source: therumpus.net

• I guess in life I find people who, at first glance, appear to be very typical or average, whatever that means, and then turn out to have hidden qualities.

  Curtis Sittenfeld

  Mean, Average, People

  Source: therumpus.net