Can you imagine writers influencing things in America? Can you imagine a writer in England influencing? Absolutely not. And in France? It used to be, but no more – absolutely not. France used to, at least, have writers as diplomats, but not any more.
NADINE GORDIMERFrom Ernest Hemingway’s stories I learned to listen within my stories for what went unsaid by my characters.
More Nadine Gordimer Quotes
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As writers, we are exploring the mystery, the mystery of existence.
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Disaster is private, in its way, as love is.
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If one will always have to feel white first, and African second, it would be better not to stay on in Africa.
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Can you imagine a writer in England influencing? Absolutely not. And in France? It used to be, but no more-absolutely not. France used to, at least, have writers as diplomats, but not any more.
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a writer doesn’t only need the time when he’s actually writing – he or she has got to have time to think and time just to let things work out. Nothing is worse for this than society. Nothing is worse for this than the abrasive, if enjoyable, effect of other people.
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Literature is one of the few areas left where black and white feel some identity of purpose; we all struggle under censorship.
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A truly living human being cannot remain neutral.
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The caged eagle become a metaphor for all forms of isolation, the ultimate in imprisonment. A zoo is prison.
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in writing, sex doesn’t matter; it’s the writing that matters.
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I decided that I wanted nothing to do with South African government television while any of my fellow writers were banned and couldn’t speak publicly.
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The tension between standing apart, and being fully involved; that is what makes a writer.
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I’m forty-nine but I could be twenty-five except for my face and my legs.
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Perhaps the best way to write is to do so as if one were already dead, afraid of no one’s reactions, answerable to no one’s views.
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I never talk about what I’m writing about currently, never. It’s private work on your own, no need or obligation to talk about it. Writers are made into performers these days, including myself, but there are some instances in which I will not perform.
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Newspapers are horror happening to other people.
NADINE GORDIMER