38 Narrator Quotes for You to Enjoy

What is most important to me is that my narrator's voice is believable, and that, though it is clearly an absolute fiction, it has the emotional resonance of memoir. Chris Bohjalian

Me Important Resonance Though Memoir Voice Absolute Emotional Clearly Most Narrator Fiction Believable

Francis Ford Coppola did this early on. You tape a movie, like a radio show, and you have the narrator read all the stage directions. And then you go back like a few days later and then you listen to the movie. And it sort of plays in your mind like a film, like a first rough cut of a movie. Al Pacino

You Mind First Few Stage Back Later Francis Directions Days Like Read Sort Ford Narrator Go Tape Did Listen Movie Cut Then Your Show Radio Rough Film Coppola Early Plays

The Narrator of 'A Sport and a Pastime' is an American photographer living in a borrowed house in what he calls 'the real France,' Autun, a small town where he hopes to take some career-changing photographs in the spirit of Atget. Alexander Chee

'Flaubert's Parrot' is an amphibious book in which what appears to be a personal essay about Flaubertian writing is gradually, delicately transformed into an extremely sad novel in which the differences between character, author, and narrator are less clear than they appear at first glance. Alvaro Enrigue

Sad Character Book Writing First Differences Extremely About Parrot Glance Clear Between Narrator Than Author Personal Essay Gradually Which Transformed Less Appear Novel Appears

I do not believe that I will ever write an adult novel from an animal's point of view unless someday it becomes suddenly appealing to me to make a narrator a mentally ill pet. Never say never. Andrea Seigel

Me Animal Pet Will Never Say Never Believe Unless Say Someday Mentally Point Point Of View Write Adult Never Make Becomes Narrator View Ill Appealing Novel Suddenly Ever

Quite often my narrator or protagonist may be a man, but I'm not sure he's the more interesting character, or if the more complex character isn't the woman. Ann Beattie

Character Man Woman Complex Complex Character Be A Man More He Protagonist Sure Narrator Quite May Often Interesting Interesting Character

I am interested in levels of brain discourse. How articulate are the voices in your head? You know, there's a different voice for the phone, and a different voice if you're talking in bed. When you're starting off with a narrator, it's interesting to think, where is their voice coming from, what part of their brain? Anne Enright

You Phone Think Voice Voices Part Head Know Talking Narrator Bed How Am Coming Discourse Brain Off Articulate Where Different Interested Interesting Your Levels Starting

The universal narrator knows all and can enter a character's head any time he chooses. Arthur Herzog

Time Character Enter He Head Knows Narrator Any Chooses Universal

I think every first-person narrator in a novel should be compromised. I prefer that word to 'unreliable.' Charles Palliser

Word Every Think Compromised Unreliable First-Person Narrator Prefer Should Novel

Usually, when I write a novel, it takes me about 100 pages to figure out the voice of the narrator. Colson Whitehead

Me Out About Voice Write Takes Narrator Pages Figure Novel

At 10, I heard Neil Diamond's 'Solitary Man' and it moved me so deeply I stood, frozen in place during school recess, feeling such empathy for the narrator in Diamond's masterpiece that my heart was smashed. Dan Hill

Me Man Heart School Feeling Diamond Solitary Neil Empathy Smashed Masterpiece Narrator Heard Stood Moved Frozen Place Deeply Recess

So much about Trump is... mysterious and slippery. Everything in his business record, you had to ask him for the details. He made himself the only source. He would either not tell you, or he was often an unreliable narrator about his own life. David Fahrenthold

Life You Business Made Own Everything Slippery Tell Would Details Record About Only Unreliable Mysterious Had He Him Himself Narrator His Source Trump Often Either Ask Much

It's amazing when I do a gig how many people of different ages come up to me afterwards and chat to me about songs. The emotions I feel are what any person can relate to. Sometimes I'm just a narrator. Ella Henderson

Me People Emotions Sometimes Amazing Relate Gig About Chat Songs Feel Come Narrator How How Many People Up Person Any Just Different Different Ages Afterwards Ages Many

A poet or prose narrator usually looks back on what he has achieved against a backdrop of the years that have passed, generally finding that some of these achievements are acceptable, while others are less so. Eyvind Johnson

Poet Others Back Backdrop Finding Some Generally He Prose Looks Acceptable Narrator Passed Years Achieved Achievements While Against Less

If somebody from the past doesn't rise up from the grave and start talking to me, I haven't got a book. I have to hear that voice, the voice of the narrator. How she sounds will tell me who she is, and who she is will tell me how she will act - and that starts the plot in motion. Geraldine Brooks

Using a first-person narrator is simply a matter of hearing the voice inside yourself. James Lee Burke

Yourself Matter Inside Voice Simply First-Person Narrator Hearing Using

The narrator of a documentary often comes in at the last minute and takes some of the glory they don't deserve. Joel Edgerton

Last-Minute Minute Some Takes Documentary Glory Narrator Often Deserve Last

In 'The Third Hotel,' my narrator, Claire, is wrestling with this sense of perpetual unfinishedness. She's trying to make sense of her husband's death, how someone's life can just stop and not continue, and of the lack of resolution in her own inner life. Laura van den Berg

Life Death Husband Own Sense Claire Someone Wrestling Hotel She Make Narrator How Continue Perpetual Trying Lack Just Stop Her Inner Inner Life Third Resolution

You could tell 'The Handmaid's Tale' from a male point of view. People have mistakenly felt that the women are oppressed, but power tends to organise itself in a pyramid. I could pick a male narrator from somewhere in that pyramid. It would interesting. Margaret Atwood

You Women People Somewhere Power Tell Would Point Could Point Of View Tends Pick Pyramid Tale Mistakenly Felt Narrator Male Oppressed Women Are Itself Handmaid Interesting Organise View

Even criticism is more interesting when the writer's authority does not only come through this omniscient narrator, but through questions, ambivalence, vulnerability. A mind questioning and on the move, not just settling down and declaring - that's one of the most interesting possibilities. Margo Jefferson

Mind Criticism Down Omniscient Settling Possibilities More Only Through Writer Come Most Vulnerability Does Narrator Questioning Questions Ambivalence Authority Move Just Interesting Declaring Even

There's something uniquely exhilarating about puzzling together the truth at the hands of an unreliable narrator. Maria Semple

Truth Together About Something Unreliable Puzzling Narrator Exhilarating Hands Uniquely

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