Latest David Bezmozgis Quotes from Interviews

• Nothing is easy in writing. I don't think for anyone. But dialogue is probably what comes most naturally to me.

  David Bezmozgis

  Writing, Thinking, Easy

  "The Believer interview". logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• There are books like Darkness at Noon, which from the prose standpoint I don't think is a perfect book. It has flaws. But for its time, it was very politically courageous.

  David Bezmozgis

  Book, Thinking, Perfect

  The Believer interview, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• Incident at Vichy, one of my favorite Arthur Miller plays, is a play in which you look at all of the different perspectives of this moral question. And it isn't so easy to decide which position is correct.

  David Bezmozgis

  Play, Perspective, Different

  The Believer interview, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• We are taught that we can be better than we are. But is there a limit to how good we can be?

  David Bezmozgis

  Limits, Taught

  The Believer interview, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• There are books where you can really see the moral question, which I think we answer every day for ourselves, in every interaction we have with people, to a lesser or greater degree.

  David Bezmozgis

  Book, Thinking, People

  The Believer interview, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• Most people will reach a point where, whatever their ideology, they will relent, or conform, and that keeps them kind of in the general mass of people. And for those who find that they can't, all of sudden they leave the general mass, they find that they become exceptions, and exceptional, and often this makes them public.

  David Bezmozgis

  People, Kind, Mass

  The Believer interview, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• Why are some people highly principled and willing to do anything for their principles, while most of us are not? And I am willing to not only ask, but also answer the question.

  David Bezmozgis

  People, Principles, Answers

  The Believer interview, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• I think having an uncompromising ideology eventually forces you out of the norm.

  David Bezmozgis

  Thinking, Force, Norm

  The Believer interview, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• Here I am: a Russian-speaking Jew living in Canada, and you, an Indian ex-patriot living in San Francisco. All of a sudden we commune in this moment about a much older Russian political dissident.That's the human part of being human: feeling those moments.

  David Bezmozgis

  San Francisco, Here I Am, Political

  The Believer interview, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• We all have some ideological quotient in ourselves. And I think it does guide who we are.

  David Bezmozgis

  Thinking, Doe, Who We Are

  The Believer interview, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• Some is, I think, the personal in any act of writing. You find yourself caught up: you start a sentence, and it becomes revelatory, not just of the character, but of you as well.

  David Bezmozgis

  Writing, Character, Thinking

  Interview with Ratik Asokan, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• There are different types of readers. People draw lines at which three things intersect: the character, the author, and the reader.

  David Bezmozgis

  Character, People, Three Things

  Interview with Ratik Asokan, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• I spent seven years writing The Free World. There are a lot of things I accomplished there that I'm very proud of, but I didn't want to spend another seven years writing a book like that.

  David Bezmozgis

  Book, Writing, Years

  The Believer interview, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• When you write a book, you want to have fidelity to the character. Characters and their emotions guide the structure of the novel.

  David Bezmozgis

  Book, Writing, Character

  The Believer interview, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• If the fidelity [ in a book] isn't maintained, the reader will think your structure is extraneous, or superficial, or that you're trying to curry favor, or live up to the expectations of some sort of genre or structure.

  David Bezmozgis

  Book, Thinking, Expectations

  "An Interview with David Bezmozgis" by Ratik Asokan, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• I think there are differences between men and women. There is more of a softness to women than there is to men, especially when it comes to those more intimate emotions: feeling love, feeling familial connections.

  David Bezmozgis

  Men, Thinking, Differences

  The Believer interview, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• I think even with women who come across with a tough exterior, the interior is the same. I think you'll find this with women around the word: some women, because of their circumstances, are forced to be tougher, forced to cultivate tougher exteriors.

  David Bezmozgis

  Thinking, Tough, Circumstances

  The Believer interview, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• In my experience of women, women have a greater capacity. Maybe women, even very pragmatic ones, are less guarded about showing emotions.

  David Bezmozgis

  Emotion, Capacity, Men Women

  Interview with Ratik Asokan, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• It's not for the writer to say whether the thing is successful or not.

  David Bezmozgis

  Successful

  The Believer interview, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• I think ex-Soviet or Russian-Jewish women are tougher and that comes through. And if they are more pragmatic than the men, it's because they are obliged to be. They have all the female responsibilities and all the male responsibilities.

  David Bezmozgis

  Responsibility, Thinking, Men

  Interview with Ratik Asokan, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• Language is a personality as well. People are different when they speak different languages.

  David Bezmozgis

  People, Personality, Different

  The Believer interview, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• I believe I'm very conscious of exactly what I'm doing. I'm auditioning lines of dialogue, and I'm interrogating whether the lines would translate from Russian into English the right way. The English that results can perhaps seem somewhat more formal than colloquial, but not so formal as to feel academic.

  David Bezmozgis

  Believe, Way, Lines

  The Believer interview, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• When writing dialogue, I hear it in both Russian and English, and try to find a language that combines the two.

  David Bezmozgis

  Writing, Two, Trying

  The Believer interview, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• People everywhere feel differently at different times of their lives.

  David Bezmozgis

  People, Different, Feels

  The Believer interview, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

• Maybe the most provocative thing one can do - and I'm not the first one to do it - is to ask the moral and philosophical question: why are some people better than others? Why are some people more moral than others?

  David Bezmozgis

  Philosophical, People, Firsts

  Interview with Ratik Asokan, logger.believermag.com. September 23, 2014.

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