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I’m not a natural criticizer – I prefer to like and praise and so on.

George Saunders

When we talk about adversity, this is the moment when character really gets tested. When things aren’t going the way you want and you can’t see anyway that they’re going to go the way you want. That’s kind of when those old virtues really become valuable and vulnerable also.
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Adversity Character Want
So here’s something I know to be true, although it’s a little corny, and I don’t quite know what to do with it.
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Advice Corny Littles
I have finally realized that, you know, it’s not a given that my lifespan will accommodate my writing aspirations.
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Aspiration Given Writing
I read to make myself feel awake.
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Awake Feels Myself
The other thing that’s useful for me is this notion of the absolute versus the relative:if we walk out and it’s a beautiful morning, it’s only a beautiful morning because we don’t have a broken leg or hemorrhoids or something.
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Beautiful Broken Morning
Every step was a victory. He had to remember that.
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Remember Steps Victory
I was a big and un-ironic fan of Dear Abby when I was a kid in Chicago. I think I sort of internalized her. So I have this inner Abby: cranky, proper, folksy yet scathing, with a beehive hairdo. But that’s my issue.
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Issues Kids Thinking
Chekhov – shall I be blunt? – is the greatest short story writer who ever lived.
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Chekhov Stories Story Writers
I’ve noticed that nowadays I’m doing a lot of stuff on the phone and on the computer, which I usually wouldn’t do earlier. And I can feel my brain being rewired:
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Interesting Phones Technology
In my case, when I am trying to be “kind” I often default in a sort of toothless loving-all stance that is, actually, not kind, because it is not truthful.
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Be Kind Truthful Trying
There’s a really nice moment in the life of a piece of writing where the writer starts to get a feeling of it outgrowing him – or he starts to see it having a life of its own that doesn’t have anything to do with his ego or his desire to ‘be a good writer’.
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Feelings Nice Writing
There comes that phase in life when, tired of losing, you decide to stop losing, then continue losing. Then you decide to really stop losing, and continue losing. The losing goes on and on so long you begin to watch with curiosity, wondering how low you can go.
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Continue Curiosity Long Losing Tired
At times, they’re so Right and I’m so Left, we agree.
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Agree Left Right
Even when the faith goes away, there’s that space where you crave something bigger than yourself. For me, that’s kind of where art came in, after that.
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Art Kind Space
Since, according to me, your life is going to be a gradual process of becoming kinder and more loving: Hurry up. Speed it along. Start right now.
GEORGE SAUNDERS

Advice Confusion Medicine
I think in our time, you know, so much of the information we get is pre-polarized. Fiction has a way of reminding us that we actually are very similar in our emotions and our neurology and our desires and our fears, so I think it’s a nice way to neutralize that polarization.
GEORGE SAUNDERS

Desire Nice Thinking

I’m not a natural criticizer – I prefer to like and praise and so on.

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I’m not a natural criticizer – I prefer to like and praise and so on.

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