I've noticed it a lot. I'm not someone who revises. It's always the first movement, it's that. It's an instinct. Either it works straight away, or it won't ever work.
Amelie NothombDefinitely. More and more I understand that it's very fine not to know where you come from. There is line in a song by Georges Brassens [French singer-songwriter]: 'Les imbciles heureux qui sont ns quelquepart.' I will never be one of the happy stupid that were born somewhere. This way of life is excellent for the imagination. It develops your paranoia. You feel paranoid when you don't understand a country, and being paranoiac is excellent for fiction.
Amelie NothombI eat in a strange way, but I enjoy it. Everything became well when I finally understood that I enjoy being hungry. Normally, I only eat in the evening.
Amelie NothombI never even dreamt of being a writer because I didn't feel allowed. When I was a child I was terribly ambitious, but I didn't know at all what this great thing would become.
Amelie NothombItโs true that someone will always say that good and evil donโt exist: that is a person who has never had any dealings with real evil. Good is far less convincing than evil, but itโs because their chemical structures are different. Like gold, good is never found in a pure state in nature: it therefore doesnโt seem impressive. It has the unfortunate tendency not to act; it prefers, passively, to be seen.
Amelie Nothomb