Chuck Klosterman Quotes About Books

Quotes about: Books

• I feel sorry for people who have to edit me. Which is why book writing is by far the most enjoyable. Really the only thing it's based on is whether it's good or not. No book editor, in my experience, is getting a manuscript and trying to rewrite it.

  Chuck Klosterman

  Sorry, Book, Writing

• Book writing is a little different because, in my case, my editor is a year younger than me and basically has the same sensibility as me.

  Chuck Klosterman

  Book, Writing, Years

• I guess it really didn't even dawn on me that you could be a rock critic as a job until I was maybe almost out of college. I knew criticism existed. I read Rolling Stone and Spin. Siskel and Ebert were on television. But I had absolutely no idea how to get that kind of life. And moreover, it didn't interest me that much. I just sort of read normal books growing up. I wasn't that media-conscious. I felt like the one thing I was able to do was to listen to a record and decide whether I liked it.

  Chuck Klosterman

  Jobs, Growing Up, Book

  Interview with Noel Murray, www.avclub.com. November 15, 2006.

• The essays are very solipsistic and self-absorbed, I'm totally conscious of that. To me, book writing is fun, and I basically just write about things that are entertaining to myself.

  Chuck Klosterman

  Fun, Book, Writing

• I get enjoyment out of writing, but I get absolutely no enjoyment out of rewriting, so I don't do much of it. The more you work on something, certainly, the better it gets. But there's also a pretty clear law of diminishing returns. It drives me crazy to do readings of my books, because if I read anything I've written in the past, I'd like to almost rewrite everything.

  Chuck Klosterman

  Crazy, Book, Reading

  Source: www.avclub.com

• It drives me crazy to do readings of my books, because if I read anything I've written in the past, I'd like to almost rewrite everything. If I could, I'd completely rewrite Fargo Rock City, and every sentence would be just slightly different. In all likelihood, most of them wouldn't be any better. Some of them would just be changed back to whatever form they used to be, before I second-guessed myself the first time.

  Chuck Klosterman

  Crazy, Book, Reading

  Interview with Noel Murray, www.avclub.com. November 15, 2006.

• The amount of response I get, in both a negative and a positive context, is completely related to the amount of books I sell, I think. It seems to have nothing to do with what I'm writing, but what degree of success I'm perceived to have.

  Chuck Klosterman

  Book, Writing, Thinking

  Source: www.avclub.com

• I think anyone who's not as good a writer as me is absolutely a hack, and I think anybody who's a slightly better writer than me is brilliant. So of course that makes me a horrible critic when it comes to books, because I can't distance my own experience from what I'm doing.

  Chuck Klosterman

  Distance, Book, Thinking

  Interview with Noel Murray, www.avclub.com. November 15, 2006.

• I think people feel very comfortable reviewing the idea of me, as opposed to what I've actually written. Most of the time, when people write about one of my books, they're really just writing about what they think I may or may not represent, as sort of this abstract entity. Is that unfair? Not really. If I put myself in this position where I'm going to kind of weave elements of memoir into almost everything, well, I suppose that's going to happen.

  Chuck Klosterman

  Book, Writing, Thinking

  Source: www.avclub.com

• The people who review my books, generally, are kind of youngish culture writers who aspire to write books, or write opinion pieces about what they think of Neil Young, or why they quit watching ER or whatever. And because of that, I think there's a lot of people who write about my books with the premise of, "Why this guy? Why not me?"

  Chuck Klosterman

  Book, Writing, Thinking

  Interview with Noel Murray, www.avclub.com. November 15, 2006.

• The people who review my books, generally, are kind of youngish culture writers who aspire to write books. When someone writes a book review, they obviously already self-identify as a writer. I mean, they are. They're writers, they're critics, and they're writing about a book about a writer who's a critic. So I think it's really hard for people to distance themselves from what they're criticizing.

  Chuck Klosterman

  Distance, Book, Writing

  Source: www.avclub.com

• When someone writes a book review, they obviously already self-identify as a writer. I mean, they are. They're writers, they're critics, and they're writing about a book about a writer who's a critic. So I think it's really hard for people to distance themselves from what they're criticizing.

  Chuck Klosterman

  Distance, Book, Writing

  Interview with Noel Murray, www.avclub.com. November 15, 2006.

• And it's kind of my own fault too, in the sense that I've used my own life as a literary device so much. I think people feel very comfortable reviewing the idea of me, as opposed to what I've actually written. I find that most of the time, when people write about one of my books, they're really just writing about what they think I may or may not represent, as sort of this abstract entity. Is that unfair? Not really. If I put myself in this position where I'm going to kind of weave elements of memoir into almost everything, well, I suppose that's going to happen.

  Chuck Klosterman

  Book, Writing, Thinking

  Interview with Noel Murray, www.avclub.com. November 15, 2006.

• The amount of response I get, in both a negative and a positive context, is completely related to the amount of books I sell, I think. It seems to have nothing to do with what I'm writing, but what degree of success I'm perceived to have. It's really weird, especially since I spent so much of my life covering people who are famous. It's interesting to actually have it happen to me on some level.

  Chuck Klosterman

  Book, Writing, Thinking

  Interview with Noel Murray, www.avclub.com. November 15, 2006.

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