The summer has ended. The garden withers. The mornings become chill. I am thirty, I am thirty-four -the years turn dry as leaves.
James SalterRead
I'm a frotteur, someone who likes to rub words in his hand, to turn them around and feel them, to wonder if that really is the best word possible.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Salter expresses the deep connection between a writer and their words, emphasizing the importance of choosing the right ones.
In this quote, James Salter portrays the act of writing as a tactile and thoughtful process. By describing himself as a 'frotteur', he invites us to visualize the careful selection and manipulation of words, akin to a craftsman at work. This reflects the writer's quest for precision and beauty in language, highlighting the intricate relationship between an author and their medium.
Themes
WritingWordsCreativityCraftsmanshipExpression
In practice
Example use cases
A writer reading this quote at a literary event to express the importance of word choice.
More from James Salter
All quotes βWhy is it so difficult to assemble those things that really matter in life and to dwell among them only? I am referring to certain landscapes, persons, beasts, books, rooms, meteorological conditions, fruits.
James SalterRead
One is seduced and battered in turn. The result is presumably wisdom. Wisdom! We are clinging to life like lizards. Why is it so difficult to assemble those things that really matter in life and to dwell among them only? I am referring to certain landscapes, persons, beasts, books, rooms, meteorological conditions, fruits. In fact, I insist on it. A letter is like a poem, it leaps into life and shows very clearly the marks, perhaps I should say thumbprints, of an unwilling or unready composer.
James SalterRead
If you read a book about school - someone else's book - you always translate it into your own school experiences. It's describing the student: he's bewildered and lost in a large crowd in a university classroom. You'll visualize that from your own experiences. So, everything you know is what you're really writing.
James SalterRead
I think you can be taught to write. You can't be taught to be a good writer. For that, you have to bring something to it, yourself, something that can't be given to you.
James SalterRead
I sometimes say that I don't make anything up - obviously that's not true. But I am uninterested in writers who say that everything comes out of the imagination. I would rather be in a room with someone who is telling the story of his life, which may be exaggerated and even have lies in it, but I want to hear the true story, essentially.
James SalterRead
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