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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

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 started publishing stories in small magazines early on, but after seven or eight or nine years you feel like you need a little more than that to show for your efforts.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Effort Eight Years
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
I never listen to music when I’m writing.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Chamber Choral Music Writing
It is sort of weird being honored for the worst day of your life.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Day Honored Worst
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
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
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
Somewhere along the way America became a giant mall with a country attached.
BEN FOUNTAIN

America Country Giant
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
From about the age of 15 or 16 I’d had the notion that I wanted to write fiction, and I’d done enough in college to satisfy myself that I had a knack for it – I wouldn’t call it “talent” – though I wondered if I’d ever have the guts to actually commit to it.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Age College Writing
The funny thing is, about the time I let go of any aspiration toward worldly success, that’s about the time I started writing decent work.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Funny Go Letting Things Writing
It’s amazing what happens when you stick yourself in a place and let things take their more or less natural course.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Courses Natural Sticks
Late bloomer’ is another way of saying ‘slow learner.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Late Learners Way
Americans are incredibly polite as long as they get what they want.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Long Polite Want
I think if you spend much time dwelling on influence you can get self-conscious about every line you write. That’s a great way to freeze up.
BEN FOUNTAIN

Self Thinking Writing

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.

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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.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Ben Fountain Quotes