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My thirty-seventh birthday had just come and gone, the end of 2008 was approaching, and I was constantly aware of how little I had managed to accomplish.

Akhil Sharma

Novels should be judged rigorously. Either a book works or it doesn’t. The fact that something is true in the real world should not lend authority to it in fiction.
AKHIL SHARMA

Authority Book Fact Fiction Novel Real Something True World Writing
Why do people always think hurting others is all right, as long as they hurt themselves as well?
AKHIL SHARMA

Always Hurt Long Themselves Thinking Well
I realized that he was writing about good people doing good things. This did not match my experience of life and so I found my sentences stretching and becoming less plain.
AKHIL SHARMA

Experience Good Less People Plain Realized Sentence Stretch Thing
I need to tell the things that are important but which don’t make sense in terms of the narrative, things that would destroy symmetry or narrative pace. This is my personal belief about what it means to write nonfiction.
AKHIL SHARMA

Important Mean Narrative Need Sense Thing Writing
Exposition suggests a great trust in the reader, and this expression of trust makes a book feel tender.
AKHIL SHARMA

Book Exposition Expression Feel Reader Suggest Tender Trust
As a human being living one’s life, one is more open to relief when there is rain or the expectation of rain. That readiness for hope gets manifested in my stories and that of many other Indian writers.
AKHIL SHARMA

Being Expectation Human Life Living More Open Rain relief
For me, a memoir is nonfiction and nonfiction has to be absolutely true.
AKHIL SHARMA

Absolute True
Even within my stories, people hold opposing views.
AKHIL SHARMA

Hold Oppose People Story View
While a dramatized scene is a way of proving and guaranteeing an emotional experience for the reader, exposition assumes that the reader is sophisticated and can see the universal.
AKHIL SHARMA

Dramatixed Emotional Experience Guarantee Proving Reader Scene Sophisticated Universal Way
My parents are deeply pious Hindus.
AKHIL SHARMA

Deeply Hindus Parent Pious
Also, I have to assume that readers are sophisticated enough to know that not every person in a community is the same, and so there are many people who would not force an abortion just because a fetus is female.
AKHIL SHARMA

Assume Community Female Many Person Reader Same Sophisticated
We all become afraid. We all look at others and think these other people are more fortunate than us.
AKHIL SHARMA

Afraid Become Fortunate Other People Think
Certainly the details of our life are unique. Spending time thinking of how I am different from someone else, however, does not tend to be very productive.
AKHIL SHARMA

Certainly Detail Different How Life Someone Spend Think Thinking Unique
When someone gets a success, and we, too, have done good work and sometimes even better work than the person who has just triumphed, we wonder: Why did success pass me by?
AKHIL SHARMA

Better Done Good Person Sometimes Success Wonder Work
It is hard to write about physically difficult things without causing the reader to disengage.
AKHIL SHARMA

Causing Difficult Disengage Physical Reader Writing
People often need to describe things quickly and so they use a shorthand. The problem is that after they use a label, they begin to think only in terms of the label instead of the totality of the experience a novel provides.
AKHIL SHARMA

Describe Need Often People Quick Shorthand Thinking Use

My thirty-seventh birthday had just come and gone, the end of 2008 was approaching, and I was constantly aware of how little I had managed to accomplish.

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My thirty-seventh birthday had just come and gone, the end of 2008 was approaching, and I was constantly aware of how little I had managed to accomplish.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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