These self-appointed deacons in the Church of Latter-Day American Literature seem to regard generosity (of words) with suspicion, texture with dislike, and any broad literary stroke with outright hate. The result is a strange and arid literary climate where a meaningless little fingernail paring like Nicholson Baker's Vox becomes an object of fascinated debate and dissection, and a truly ambitious American novel like Matthew's Heart of the Country is all but ignored.
Stephen KingCome to a book as you would come to an unexplored land. Come without a map. Explore it, and draw your own map.... A book is like a pump. It gives nothing unless first you give to it.
Stephen KingOnce I start work on a project, I donโt stop and I donโt slow down unless I absolutely have to. If I donโt write every day, the characters begin to stale off in my mind โ they begin to seem like characters instead of real people. The taleโs narrative cutting edge starts to rust and I begin to lose my hold on the storyโs plot and pace. Worst of all, the excitement of spinning something new begins to fade. The work starts to feel like work, and for most writers that is the smooch of death.
Stephen King