Ethan Canin

Bausch is a wonderful storyteller. He's a mature writer who has a lot of confidence in the quality of character. He doesn't need to hook you with a sneaky plot and zany characters.

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If you try to write a novel in L.A., you're a chump; everyone is speeding by, and you're driving a rickshaw.

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In the winter, I read next to a wood-burning stove. In the summer, we have a place up in Michigan where I like to read in a hammock. It's almost entirely hidden by cedar trees and right up by the water. You can climb in there and see nothing but water and be seen by nobody. It's perfect.

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Your first book is kind of a labor of ignorance. You don't realize the difficulty of it. Your second book is sort of a labor of fear. Then you sort of either hit a stride, or you don't.

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I'm a craftsman type of teacher. I don't like the thematic type of teaching that takes place in a lot of colleges.

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I think even great writers only write two books that you might like. When I think of my touchstone writers like Saul Bellow, I think of 'Henderson the Rain King.' With Don DeLillo, I think of 'Libra.'

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I'm becoming more of a novelist as I get older. The novel just seems the truer form. There's less artifice involved.

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I no longer practice medicine, but I can say that, for me, medicine was easier - and certainly less emotionally turbulent - than writing.

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You have to look at the value of different kinds of words. Adjectives weaken, and adverbs come even farther down the line. Verbs are strong; verbs and nouns.

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Quotes by Ethan Canin