Narrative Voice Quotes

We're all the heroes of our own stories. So, when I am inside the head of a character who would otherwise be considered a villain, I have a great deal of affection for that character and I'm trying to see the world and the events through their eyes.

Writing is an act of faith, not a trick of grammar.

When I read 'Greenberg,' I had a really strong sense if I could be any kind of writer I wanted to be, I'd be this kind of writer. And I felt like, even in my experiences, what writing I had done, even on a small scale, when it was good, it shared some quality with it.

Every story you tell is your own story.

I've written short stories from male perspectives before, and I've never had a problem with it as long as I've understood the character's emotions and motivations.

That's one of the great thing about writing is that you get to be in someone's head.

I find it an easy way into writing pieces is to think what the character's voice is like, and start from there.

I think the main thing to remember when writing a novel is to stay true to the characters.

When I was writing my first novel, 'Where the Line Bleeds,' which had young black men as its main characters, I was very invested in telling the story and also very worried about the effects the story would have.

I have often said I come from a family of unreliable narrators. I tend to believe their struggles with racism, identity, nationality do dovetail with my motivation to write.

I think it has most to do with the way in which a story is told, whether it feels real either via the music of the telling or the 'honesty' of the story.

I was taking my first uncertain steps towards writing for children when my own were young. Reading aloud to them taught me a great deal when I had a great deal to learn. It taught me elementary things about rhythm and pace, the necessary musicality of text.

A petty reason perhaps why novelists more and more try to keep a distance from journalists is that novelists are trying to write the truth and journalists are trying to write fiction.

It's not a terribly original thing to say, but I love Raymond Carver. For one thing, he's fun to read out loud.

The writer may very well serve a movement of history as its mouthpiece, but he cannot of course create it.

I'm never writing as a character.

Our own lives always influence the way we write.

If you don't have a unique voice, then you're not really a writer.

I was raised in Harlem. I never found a book that took place in Harlem. I never had a church like mine in a book. I never had people like the people I knew. People who could not find their lives in books and celebrated felt bad about themselves. I needed to write to include the lives of these young people.

I think the plasticity of the novel is its greatest challenge. There are no rules; there is no necessary form. You can know what you want it to be, or do, and still not know how to write it. There are endless possibilities, infinite choices. What voice should it be in? What events to start with? What characters will be part of it?

Creating is one thing; telling the story is one thing. I see myself more as a storyteller than a story creator.

What I want is to respond to the challenge posed by the mass media - to permit the novel to say what can only be said by narrative - to allow it to be itself.

I don't begin a novel until I have written, not just the last sentence, but usually, as a result thereof, many of the surrounding final paragraphs, so that in addition to knowing what happens, I know what the voice is.

All of my novels are democracies.

To me, I'm a storyteller.