Sara Zarr Quotes

When I don't know what to do with a character, that's when I say yes to it. When it's far away from the way I am, the way I feel or the way I think, that's when it's more attractive.

I'm not likely to be attracted to characters I've already done. I have to be almost frightened by the possibility of taking it on. Over the years, I realise I must enjoy walking that edge; I keep doing it.

After a while, the character sort of took over.

Yeah, and the language the "we" has, and the character the "we" has. Because that was the part of the book that I didn't plan out, but the part that I was most curious about as I was writing. You know what you're doing, but you're sometimes still sort of curious as you're writing it.

In an essay, you have the outcome in your pocket before you set out on your journey, and very rarely do you make an intellectual or psychological discovery. But when you write fiction, you don't know where you are going - sometimes down to the last paragraph - and that is the pleasure of it.

With any half-hour comedy, it kind of takes on its own life and finds itself.

Over time, it's occurred to me that my protagonists all originate in some aspect of myself that I find myself questioning or feeling uncomfortable about.

With fiction, you can take something that bothers you, or that you don't have in clear focus, and you can put it under as much stress as you want. Really get underneath the skin. With nonfiction, you're restricted to what happened.

I've tried very hard and I've never found any resemblance between the people I know and the people in my novels.

With each book I write, I become more and more convinced that the books have a life of their own, quite apart from me.

Stories surge up out of nowhere, and if they feel compelling, you follow them. You let them unfold inside you and see where they are going to lead.

It can certainly happen that characters in more sophisticated stories can 'take over' as they develop and change the author's original ideas. Well, it certainly happens to me at times.

My truth - what I believe - is that there are no answers here and, if you are looking for answers, you'd better choose the question carefully.

I don't set out to write female lead shows, necessarily. I like deeply flawed characters. When they come to me, or when I'm introduced to them, I follow the stories and the people, rather than setting out to do a female lead thing.

I love to get to that place where I don't know what kind of music I'm doing; I don't know if it's any good. I don't know if it's anything. It's a big question mark. The idea is to have interesting results. That's my bottom line.

I'm not in the business of meddling with people's destinies - and yes, my characters are real people to me. They have histories and thoughts and yearnings and hurts and misgivings and pleasures that don't belong to me.

Acting is fascinating to me. I love unlocking the mysteries with characters and finding out what would be the most intriguing aspect of that character to exist in. Figuring out a person and getting to be a different person every day, hey - that's pretty lucky. I don't have to wake up and be Amanda if I don't feel like it. You know, that's fun.

Writing is like a rollercoaster ride for me, an adventure. I love exploring the world through 'playing' people who are absolutely nothing like me.

I do think that the abiding mystery of my origins has definitely had a profound effect upon my writing. There is that thing in the back of my mind where I think I don't really know who I am. And it may make it a little easier to shift around in my narrative voice.

I really fall in love with my characters, even the bad ones. I love getting together with them. They tell me what to do; they take me on a wild and wonderful trip.

I think once you write fiction, you put it out, and it can be interpreted in a variety of ways, some of which are going to be shocking to the writer.

To me, what is important in the theater is that we don't want to make a conclusion. We don't want to make a statement, don't want to say what something is. We want to ask, 'What is it?'

I don't want to put meaning on what I do because I don't know what it is.

I stay true because whatever the project is, I'm still looking for inside of that character. It's the thing that connects him to me and to everybody else. So, the search is the same. It's to unveil the truth, and that's how I stay true, because my purpose isn't altered.

I always say I write because I have questions, not because I have answers. It's true that you begin the conversation - that's the role of the artist. But it's not my job to tell us what to do next. I wish I had those tools.