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Home
Authors
Jim Harrison
American
Writer
About the author
Michigan is two radically different places - the North and the South which makes for good drama and contrast.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Drama
#Contrast
Naturally we would prefer seven epiphanies a day and an earth not so apparently devoid of angels.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Day
#Earth
#Angels
Writers can write outside their ethnicity or sex depending how open and vulnerable they wish to be.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Writers
#Open
#Sex
The fact is, the media never gets off the interstate unless there's a major explosion.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Fact
#Media
Short things are short all over and long things are long all over.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
So when I made some money, I didn't have any idea how one handled such a situation because no one in our family ever had any money.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Family
#Idea
#Money
Some people hear their own inner voices with great clearness. And they live by what they hear. Such people become crazy... or they become legend.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#People
Success and money can really be quite blinding.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Success
#Money
New Yorkers are mostly interested in New York - in case you haven't noticed.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
The old fun thing is when somebody typed up the first chapter of War and Peace. And then made a precis of the rest of it and sent it out and only one publisher recognized it.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Fun
#War
#Peace
#Old
#First
#Rest
The only advice I can give to aspiring writers is don't do it unless you're willing to give your whole life to it. Red wine and garlic also helps.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Life
#Writers
#Advice
#Wine
The trajectory started when I was on the roof of our house looking out at a swamp when I was 19. I had written for several years, starting at about 15, but that day on the roof I took my vows and acknowledged my calling.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Years
#Day
We are all naturally xenophobic.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
Writing as a woman presents enormous problems but I have attempted it several times and haven't had many complaints.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Problems
#Woman
#Writing
#Complaints
Yeah, but now suddenly - you know, universities are notoriously market oriented, too.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Now
Your kids inevitably want to move where they had their vacations when they were younger.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Want
#Kids
I got $30 from Nation magazine for a poem and $500 for my first book of poems.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#First
#Nation
#Poems
I've never felt influenced by Ernest Hemingway though I suppose there is something inevitable there.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
There is a neurologist, a woman over at Harvard who wanted me to come talk to them, and in France I have a lot of readers in the sciences. I can't tell you why.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Talk
#Woman
#France
I enjoy about 1 out of 100 movies, it's about the same proportion to books published that I care to read.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Books
#Movies
#Care
I see more genuine sociability between the races in Mississippi than I see in Michigan. No question.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Question
Because most writers have totally unrealistic concepts of how publishing works.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Writers
#Publishing
Everybody has a gun in their car in Detroit.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Car
I asked a French critic a couple of years ago why my books did so well in France. He said it was because in my novels people both act and think. I got a kick out of that.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#People
#Years
#Books
#Act
#France
I can write anywhere.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
I couldn't run a tight schedule, and if you're any good at teaching, you get sucked dry because you like your students and you're trying to help them, but you don't have any time left to write yourself.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Time
#Teaching
#Trying
#Help
#Students
I do have trouble with titles.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Trouble
#Titles
I'm not rational enough to be a good journalist.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
I don't see gender as the most significant fact of human existence.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Fact
#Existence
#Gender
I rarely read or buy a book because of a review.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
After a lifetime of world travel I've been fascinated that those in the third world don't have the same perception of reality that we do.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#World
#Perception
#Reality
#Travel
I should add that I very much enjoy certain cities especially Paris, New York and Chicago.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Chicago
#Cities
#Paris
I thought, frankly, that it would be more pleasant to write a memoir than it was.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Thought
I used to get criticized for putting food in novels.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Food
I write novellas because I don't like loose sprawling prose.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Prose
I'm actually forced to write about Michigan because as a native of that state it's the place I know best.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#State
I don't know what psychotherapy does. I have been seeing the same person for 26 years now.
Jim Harrison,
American
Writer
#Now
#Years