Latest Michael Ondaatje Quotes from Interviews

Quotes about:

• When I began to write novels, I wanted to keep that element of interaction with the reader that exists in poetry, not just for the reader to be shepherded from A to B to C to D but to participate, and the less you say sometimes, the better it is. You know, it's the way when someone speaks very quietly, you move forward so you can listen more carefully.

  Michael Ondaatje

  Moving, Writing, Sometimes

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• Politically I don't believe anymore that we can only have one voice to a story, it's like having one radio station to represent a country.

  Michael Ondaatje

  Country, Believe

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• The one of the great sadnesses of any life is knowing what you know now and then remembering what you did not know then.

  Michael Ondaatje

  Sadness, Remember, Now And Then

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• As someone who writes novels that are often set in other periods of time or other ages or other landscapes, there's a certain element of research I have to do, and often, the more laconic people are, the more interesting they become.

  Michael Ondaatje

  Writing, People, Interesting

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• You are doing something over here and over there someone is telling you a joke, or giving you an important piece of information about sanitation, and no matter how weird the other subject is, there is a connection, or you can make a connection. I’ve always loved history and history is collage, it is a juxtaposition of the good and the bad and the strange, and how you place those sentences together changes the whole mood of a history.

  Michael Ondaatje

  Giving, Important, Together

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• I've always loved history and history is collage, it is a juxtaposition of the good and the bad and the strange, and how you place those sentences together changes the whole mood of a history.

  Michael Ondaatje

  Together, Juxtaposition, Strange

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• When I read biographies, I skip the first thirty pages about the childhood because it doesn't seem interesting to me.

  Michael Ondaatje

  Interesting, Childhood, Biographies

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• If you look at Japanese film, it is made up of collage or bricolage, it is made up of lists, and suddenly when you stand back from the lists you begin to see the pattern of a life.

  Michael Ondaatje

  Looks, Patterns, Lists

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• When I write my novels I don't really have a huge plan beforehand; I don't have the whole plot and architecture, so the story is sort of discovered as I write it.

  Michael Ondaatje

  Writing, Plot, Stories

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• That's one of the great sadnesses of any life - knowing what you know now and then remembering what you did not know then.

  Michael Ondaatje

  Sadness, Knowing, Remember

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• I want the marginality to come into the center. This is the thing I was conscious of growing up, when I later lived in England. I saw all these war movies that came out shortly after the war, and they were all about the war being fought by Englishmen or Americans, there were no other "allies" in it - from India or Australia, etc.

  Michael Ondaatje

  Growing Up, War, Australia

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• Politically I also don't believe anymore that we can only have one voice to a story, it's like having one radio station to represent a country. You want the politics of any complicated situation to be complicated in a book of fiction or nonfiction.

  Michael Ondaatje

  Country, Believe, Book

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• There always should be something hanging unfinished before a scene ends so that there's a reason for going to the next scene.

  Michael Ondaatje

  Next, Reason, Scene

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• I think precision in writing goes hand in hand with not trying to say everything. You try and say two-thirds, so the reader will involve himself or herself.

  Michael Ondaatje

  Writing, Thinking, Hands

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

• There's a lot of thievery involved in writing. You're breaking into other people's spaces and other people's stories.

  Michael Ondaatje

  Writing, Space, People

  "Michael Ondaatje, Among Thieves". Interview with Maddie Oatman, www.motherjones.com. September/October 2011.

• People don't write about kids; you have to give them a lot of freedom, and that causes anarchy and that causes farce.

  Michael Ondaatje

  Writing, Kids, People

  "Michael Ondaatje, Among Thieves". Interview with Maddie Oatman, www.motherjones.com. September/October 2011.

• I kind of was shoveled onto a boat at 11 and went to England. I didn't have any parent watching over me. It was very free and may have been a bit of a scary time for me, but I really don't remember much about the voyage apart from playing ping-pong a lot with a couple friends.

  Michael Ondaatje

  Couple, Parent, Scary

• I often need a limited space. It's like having a house to roam around in and reinvent and have things to happen in, kind of like a French farce. Doors opening, doors closing, new people arriving, and disappearing, and so forth.

  Michael Ondaatje

  Doors, Space, People