Top Bonnie Jo Campbell Quotes

Bonnie Jo Campbell Biography

Bonnie Jo Campbell (born September 14, 1962) in Kalamazoo, Michigan is an American novelist and short story writer. Her most recent work is Mothers, Tell Your Daughters, published with W.W. Norton and Company.

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Bonnie Jo Campbell Quotes

The great thing about fiction is that I don't have to settle on an answer to any troubling question, or even a solution. I hope that my stories serve as explorations and help show readers how and why real-life women don't always make the "correct" decisions in the face of economic and sexual troubles. We all screw up, but the women I write about don't have back-up plans or money in the back or resources to fix what they have broken.

Broken, Correct, Decision, Sexual, Thing, Writing

I didn't actually figure out how to get guidance, so I just decided to go to school at University of Southern California because they sent me a glossy brochure.

California, Decided, Glossy, Guidance, School, Southern

Mothers aren't allowed to have favorite children!

Allowed, Children, Favorite, Mother, Mothers

I enjoy shooting. Around where I live, it's something you do for entertainment once in a while, you go out and shoot targets.

Enjoy, Entertainment, Live, Shooting, Target, Targets

Some people tell me they would be afraid of my characters, but I tell those people [that] they meet these characters all the time. They just don't care about them when they meet them, at the gas station, the car wash, the post office even.

Character, People, Car, Post, Office

My normal writing day involves three hours of actual writing, before noon, and the rest is just feeding the writing. There is teaching (so I can afford to write), travel to be planned and executed. There are dozens of emails daily, gardening, lots of dishes (where do all these dishes come from?), daily family emergencies, and, of course, the petting of the donkeys. The smell of donkeys is heavenly, and their he-honking is the sweetest music. I feel calm just thinking about them.

Dozens, Petting, Teaching, Thinking, Travel, Writing

We have a shotgun we inherited from my father-in-law, a paranoid Englishman living in Texas. I have a. 22 Marlin rifle, similar to the one Annie Oakley had, and my husband has a. 357 Magnum pistol. All those are locked up tight, of course. We have a couple of pellet guns that get more use than the real guns.

Couple, Englishman, Father, Husband, Locked, Paranoid

I'm of the people in the bar and the people in my stories. They are my tribe.

Bar, Bars, People, Stories

There were a lot of beautiful, thin people out there driving nice cars. It was a whole different experience being in L. A.

Beautiful, Different Experiences, Driving, Experience, Nice, Whole

Drugs and drinking affect every family I know, country and city, middle-class and poor.

Country, Drinking, Class, Poor, Know

You can't beat a good sonnet, and you can write a sonnet without being married to the damned thing.

Beats, Damned, Married, Sonnet, Writing

Weirdly the writing experience has not really changed that much except it used to be that I was busy because I had to work a couple of jobs to earn money, so I didn't have time to write.

Changed, Couple, Jobs, Money, Used, Writing

As a writer, I can live somewhat independently, occupying nooks and crannies and finding meaning there. I can even live in my mind a good portion of most days.

Days, Findings, Live, Mind, Portions, Writer

I grew up with donkeys, as well as horses, but I'm more interested in donkeys.

Donkey, Donkeys, Grew Up, Horse, Horses, Interested

Any of us who listen to the news or listen to stories our neighbors tell are accustomed to violence. We have to decide then to ignore the violence and create a gentler world in our fiction, or to heighten the violence through the use of point-of-view in order to explore it and gain some insight and understanding. Since I'm living with the violence and trouble in my brain, it's kind of a relief to write about it, to get it on paper, to put it in context, to find meaning in it.

Brain, Gentler, Understanding, Use, Write, Writing

We know that we need to explore desire in fiction - many say that the only way a story exists is that a character feels a strong desire - and nature is the place where creatures act on their desires in the most pure way imaginable, so maybe nature also works as a metaphor for whatever emotional troubles my characters have to negotiate. I'm interested in my characters as survivors, and maybe that works best when the old-fashioned notion of humans surviving in wilderness is not too far away.

Strong, Character, Emotional, Humans, Pure

I'm pro-life, in the sense that chaos seems like life to me and order seems like death.

Chaos, Death, Life, Order, Pro Life

Where I live you're not supposed to shoot a firearm within a quarter mile of a dwelling.

Dwelling, Firearm, Live, Miles, Quarters, Supposed

I think back when I was kind of a crappy writer, I really did know my time was better spent working and having adventures and seeing the world.

Adventure, Having, Seeing, Thinking, World, Writer

I figure that I'm always going to be fine, one way or another, but I do worry about other people who have difficulty moving from one world to the next. It's the folks who are truly invested in their lives who have the hardest time with change.

Moving, People, Worry, Time, Hardest

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Bonnie Jo Campbell Biography

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