RICHARD BAUSCH

Mostly you write to find out what you have to say.

To my mind, nothing is as important as good writing, because in literature, the walls between people and cultures are broken down, and the things that plague us most—suspicion and fear of the other, and the tendency to see whole groups of people as objects, as monoliths of one cultural stereotype or another—are defeated. This work is not done as a job, ladies and gentlemen, it is done out of love for the art and the artists who brought it forth, and who still bring it forth to us, down the years and across ignorance and chaos and borderlines.

A good story needs only a good storyteller.

Every really good book was written a little at a time, over time, in tremendous confusion and doubt.

I love teaching. If I made a trillion dollars, I would still teach. It's different every day. You get to meet intelligent people all the time - or at least most of the time.

The fact is, for all the critics' talk about me as a realist, I'm making everything up - everything. It is all about imagining with me.

I don't teach writing. I teach patience. Toughness. Stubbornness. The willingness to fail. I teach the life. The odd thing is most of the things that stop an inexperienced writer are so far from the truth as to be nearly beside the point. When you feel glosbal doubt about your talent, that is your talent. People who have no talent don't have any doubt.

Keep everything in context, and try to have each line doing more than one thing - not just giving exposition but also revealing character and history, etc.

Once, I thought I had a novel, and it turned out it was only a short story. I wrote about 800 pages, but it ended up being a short story. And if it ever happens to me again, I Will Go Insane.

When you reach a place where you feel blocked, lower your standards and keep on going. There is no possible way to do permanent damage to a piece of writing. You cannot ruin it. You can only make it a little better a little at a time.

The fact is, for all the critics' talk about me as a realist, I'm making everything up - everything. It is all about imagining with me.

Read the writers whose work is still around and has survived the winds of fashion and the attacks of the ignorant and the bigoted - read everything you can get your hands on.

Every really good book was written a little at a time, over time, in tremendous confusion and doubt.

Write a little bit every day, each day. Visit it, every day - in other words, show up for work.

I always write stories, and I write poems, too. I just never sell them to anybody, but I write them. They're good, too. They never leave the house. They're too disclosing.

Keep everything in context, and try to have each line doing more than one thing - not just giving exposition but also revealing character and history, etc.

In every circumstance, all my life, my mind shows me the possible bad outcome: someone walks down steps, and before I can do anything to head the image off, I see a fall, a catastrophe.

I love teaching. If I made a trillion dollars, I would still teach. It's different every day. You get to meet intelligent people all the time - or at least most of the time.

Once, I thought I had a novel, and it turned out it was only a short story. I wrote about 800 pages, but it ended up being a short story. And if it ever happens to me again, I Will Go Insane.

To my mind, nothing is as important as good writing, because in literature, the walls between people and cultures are broken down, and the things that plague us most—suspicion and fear of the other, and the tendency to see whole groups of people as objects, as monoliths of one cultural stereotype or another—are defeated. This work is not done as a job, ladies and gentlemen, it is done out of love for the art and the artists who brought it forth, and who still bring it forth to us, down the years and across ignorance and chaos and borderlines.

When you reach a place where you feel blocked, lower your standards and keep on going. There is no possible way to do permanent damage to a piece of writing. You cannot ruin it. You can only make it a little better a little at a time.

A good story needs only a good storyteller.

I don't teach writing. I teach patience. Toughness. Stubbornness. The willingness to fail. I teach the life. The odd thing is most of the things that stop an inexperienced writer are so far from the truth as to be nearly beside the point. When you feel glosbal doubt about your talent, that is your talent. People who have no talent don't have any doubt.

Mostly you write to find out what you have to say.