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The Kessler Theater is one such gem, an Art Deco beauty … for a slice of real life, there’s always the Kessler.

Ben Fountain

If a person wants to be of any use to himself, he better insist on getting his fair share of beauty and pleasure, and if there’s something about the system that’s keeping him from getting his share, then I think he’s well within his rights to fight to change that.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Fighting Rights Thinking
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
Somewhere along the way America became a giant mall with a country attached.
BEN FOUNTAIN

America Country Giant
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
Eruptions of talent continue to happen in Haiti, in spite of everything.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Country Everything Talent
I really had to decide why I was writing. I had no interest in going back to law; I very briefly – for about six hours – considered going to get my MBA, but in the end, I realized that the only work I really wanted to do was write.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Consider Hour Law Writing
There was no such thing as perfection in this world, only moments of such extreme transparency that you forgot yourself, a holy mercy if there ever was one.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Moments Perfection World
It is sort of weird being honored for the worst day of your life.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Day Honored Worst
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
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’m ashamed and embarrassed to say that I’ve read very little of David Foster Wallace’s work. It’s a huge gap in my education, one of many.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Ashamed Gaps Littles
I got brilliant stories from people who’d never set foot in an MFA program and had published very little, and terrible stories from people who’d published a lot and had all the credentials. It was all over the map and that was part of the fun.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Feet Fun People
I took two fiction-writing courses in college and majored in literature. I felt that I had a knack though I wouldn’t go so far as to call it a talent. But it scared me. I felt it was a childish thing wanting to write and that I would forget about it eventually.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Call College Literature Two Writing
I never listen to music when I’m writing.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Chamber Choral Music 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
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

The Kessler Theater is one such gem, an Art Deco beauty … for a slice of real life, there’s always the Kessler.

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The Kessler Theater is one such gem, an Art Deco beauty … for a slice of real life, there’s always the Kessler.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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