George Saunders Quotes About Desire

Quotes about: Desire

• I have a sense that God is unfair and preferentially punishes his weak, his dumb, his fat, his lazy. I believe he takes more pleasure in his perfect creatures, and cheers them on like a brainless dad as they run roughshod over the rest of us. He gives us a need for love, and no way to get any. He gives us a desire to be liked, and personal attributes that make us utterly unlikable. Having placed his flawed and needy children in a world of exacting specifications, he deducts the difference between what we have and what we need from our hearts and our self-esteem and our mental health.

  George Saunders

  Running, Cheer, Children

  "George Saunders's funny, sad stories from a divided nation" by Chris Power, www.theguardian.com. October 13, 2016.

• It was that impossible thing: happiness that does not wilt to reveal the thin shoots of some new desire rising from within it.

  George Saunders

  Impossible Things, Desire, Doe

  George Saunders (2013). “Tenth of December: Stories”, p.36, Random House

• My understanding of kindness is that we are hoping to be truly beneficial in every situation, and that this desire means a whole suite of things: being nicer, sure, but also being more aware, more present, more articulate, more fearless, less habituated, etc., etc. And sometimes even being firm, or having an edge, or even being angry.

  George Saunders

  Kindness, Mean, Understanding

  "George Saunders on Trump, Mystery, and Why He Rejects Social Media". Interview with Catherine Woodiwiss, sojo.net. August 30, 2016.

• I might take from the current political chaos a desire to somehow reflect its essential qualities in a story - the blatant lies that get accepted with repetition; the way mass media seems to be agitating people en masse; the way, particularly, that a relatively lucky and affluent and privileged population can be undone by a certain spoiled quality; that feeling when two decent people violently disagree, because they are arguing from two non-intersecting data sets - well, the list goes on.

  George Saunders

  Lying, Media, Data

  "George Saunders on Trump, Mystery, and Why He Rejects Social Media". Interview with Catherine Woodiwiss, sojo.net. August 30, 2016.

• I think in our time, you know, so much of the information we get is pre-polarized. Fiction has a way of reminding us that we actually are very similar in our emotions and our neurology and our desires and our fears, so I think it's a nice way to neutralize that polarization.

  George Saunders

  Nice, Thinking, Desire

  "Conversation: George Saunders, Author of ‘Tenth of December’". Interview with Jeffrey Brown, www.pbs.org. January 18, 2013.

• All storytelling is kind of that - there's a bit of text that you put pressure on that spits out some desire that a character has and then you follow that. The other part is that every scene raises an expectation in the reader's mind - that's part of its job is to make you look in and be curious.

  George Saunders

  Jobs, Character, Expectations

  Interview with Jenny Shank, www.patheos.com. March 6, 2017.

• I'm finding, as I get older, that I'm not much of a believer in redemption. I mean, I believe in redemption in real life - redemption does happen, and it's cool when it does - but I find myself getting leery of my desire for it in stories (especially my own).

  George Saunders

  Real, Believe, Mean

  "George Saunders's Wild Ride" by Deborah Treisman, www.newyorker.com. December 12, 2010.

• The mind is a machine that is constantly asking: What would I prefer? Close your eyes, refuse to move, and watch what your mind does. What it does is become discontent with that-which-is. A desire arises, you satisfy that desire, and another arises in its place.

  George Saunders

  Moving, Eye, Mind

  George Saunders (2012). “The Brain-Dead Megaphone”, p.214, A&C Black

• There's a really nice moment in the life of a piece of writing where the writer starts to get a feeling of it outgrowing him - or he starts to see it having a life of its own that doesn't have anything to do with his ego or his desire to 'be a good writer'.

  George Saunders

  Nice, Writing, Feelings

  "George Saunders and Andy Ward". Interview with Andy Ward, www.slate.com. January 07, 2013.

• What a powerful thing to know: That one's own desires are mappable onto strangers; that what one finds in oneself will most certainly be found in The Other.

  George Saunders

  Powerful, Desire, Stranger

  George Saunders (2012). “The Brain-Dead Megaphone”, p.55, A&C Black

• It seems to me that there are certain thoughts and vignettes and attitudes that I have always had the desire to represent.

  George Saunders

  Attitude, Desire, Vignettes

  Interview with Andy Ward, www.slate.com. January 7, 2013.

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