Carolyn Chute

When I'm not writing, I do a lot of research reading on the shape of civilization. Fiction can be a lot of different things... but I feel like it's my job to write about the way things are.

My people are mostly underweight or overweight - however it is they turned out, like good bread. Bring back the hunched-over people... Bring back humanity.

There's no writer's block; there's only distraction.

I love a big book, but it's what most people like which makes commerce sing.

I love people, but I don't do so well in a system. We're poor, and we lead a very different kind of life. We depend on other people so much.

When I write, I just let my characters go, the way I let life go.

You go through your life feeling like an outsider, and you respond to society in a different way when you feel like an outsider.

Whenever I write, I write what I find to be the way people are. I never use any symbolism at all, but if you write as true to life as you possibly can, people will see symbolism. They'll all see different symbolism, but they're apt to because you can see it in life.

I am a person who can't teach writing or make a living in any public way, as I get confused when interrupted or overstimulated. In a classroom or crowded room, I all but blank out. So my only income is from novels.

That's the way we see life: your community is your survival. And if you live in a small community like this, even the people you hate you have as friends.

Your community is your survival.

When people do come face to face with each other as human beings, they begin to understand each other better.