Quote of the Day (Paul Auster, on Writing by Hand Vs. a Keyboard)

“Keyboards have always intimidated me. I’ve never been able to think clearly with my fingers in that position. A pen is a much more primitive instrument. You feel that the words are coming out of your body and then you dig the words into the page. Writing has always had that tactile quality for me. It’s a physical experience.”—American novelist Paul Auster (1947-2024), interviewed by Michael Wood, “The Art of Fiction No. 178,” The Paris Review, Issue 167 (Fall 2003)

The image accompanying this post, of Paul Auster at the 2007 Brooklyn Book Festival, was taken Sept. 16, 2007, by Piktor08.

Quote of the Day (Paul Auster, on Language as ‘The Way We Exist in the World’)

"Language is not truth. It is the way we exist in the world. Playing with words is merely to examine the way the mind functions, to mirror a particle of the world as the mind perceives it."— American novelist Paul Auster, The Invention of Solitude (1982)

(David Shankbone photograph of Paul Auster at a breakfast honoring Israeli writer Amos Oz on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City, September 24, 2008)

Quote of the Day (Paul Auster, on Love)

“I had jumped off the edge, and then, at the very last moment, something reached out and caught me in midair. That something is what I define as love. It is the one thing that can stop a man from falling, powerful enough to negate the laws of gravity.”—American novelist Paul Auster, Moon Palace (1989)

(David Shankbone photograph of Paul Auster at a breakfast honoring Israeli writer Amos Oz on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City, September 24, 2008)