black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

It’s amazing what happens when you stick yourself in a place and let things take their more or less natural course.

Ben Fountain

I quit law in 1988 to start writing, and it took me 17 years from that point to get a book contract. I guess you can say I was on the slow train.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Contract Law Quit Took
I realized I was never going to have any peace with myself unless I made an honest stab at trying to write.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Honest Trying Writing
Late bloomer’ is another way of saying ‘slow learner.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Late Learners Way
I thought when I started writing that I’d have a book out in four or five years, and as it became apparent that that wasn’t going to happen, I became increasingly frustrated and unsure of myself.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Book Writing Years
If you could figure out how to live with family then you’d gone a long way toward finding your peace.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Gone Long Way
Americans are incredibly polite as long as they get what they want.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Long Polite Want
Haiti is unique – the first successful slave revolt in history, the first black republic etc., and then when you get into the culture, the voodoo, and that wonderful synchretization of Christian and African belief and symbology, it’s like nothing the world has ever seen.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Christian Successful Unique
I have a horror of being self-indulgent and wasting time, and there is that risk in doing this kind of work. Are you totally deluded in sitting down at a desk every day and trying to write something? Is it self-indulgent, or might it possibly lead to something worthwhile?
BEN FOUNTAIN

Risk Self Writing
I never listen to music when I’m writing.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Chamber Choral Music Writing
It took me 10 years to write a story that pleased me – that I could look at after it was published and not cringe.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Looks Writing Years
If you want to write, then write; if you don’t want to write, then don’t write. I fell into the former category, and I just made the decision that I’d keep on because I liked it and might someday do something decent.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Category Decision Writing
Maybe the light’s at the other end of the tunnel.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Ends Light Tunnel
By the end of the first decade of writing, I considered myself a confirmed failure in the eyes of the world.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Eye World Writing
I kept going back while I was writing the novel – which never sold, may it rest in peace – and by the time it was finished I had too many connections to Haiti to walk away.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Connection Peace Rest Writing
You’d think family would be the one sure thing in life, the gimme? Points you got just for being born? So much thick, meaty stuff bound you to these people.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Life Struggle Things Thinking
Eruptions of talent continue to happen in Haiti, in spite of everything.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Country Everything Talent

It’s amazing what happens when you stick yourself in a place and let things take their more or less natural course.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

It’s amazing what happens when you stick yourself in a place and let things take their more or less natural course.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Ben Fountain Quotes