Top Geoff Dyer Quotes - Quotesmemo.com

Geoff Dyer Biography

Geoff Dyer (born 5 June 1958) is an English writer. He is the author of four novels and seven books of non-fiction, which have won a number of literary awards and been translated into 24 languages. Kathryn Schulz, writing in New York, described him as "one of our greatest living critics, not of the arts but of life itself, and one of our most original writers".

Read about Geoff Dyer in Wikipedia

Random Authors

Geoff Dyer Quotes

The perfect life, the perfect lie, I realised after Christmas, is one which prevents you from doing that which you would ideally have done (painted, say, or written unpublishable poetry) but which, in fact, you have no wish to do. People need to feel that they have been thwarted by circumstances from pursuing the life which, had they led it, they would not have wanted; whereas the life they really want is precisely a compound of all those thwarting circumstances.

Christmas, Lying, People, Perfect, Wish

When you are lonely, writing can keep you company. It is also a form of self-compensation, a way of making up for things—as opposed to making things up—that did not quite happen.

Lonely, Quite, Self, Way, Writing

One of the reasons so many nonfiction books are so boring is because what they've done, very diligently, is fulfill the terms of their proposals. They've written up their proposal, long-form, and often what this does is then set up a sort of serial deal, where the whole book can essentially be reduced back to the size of the original proposal!

Book, Deal, Diligently, Long, Nonfiction

I always like to be in the presence of people who are good at and love their jobs, Irrespective of their jobs.

And Love, Irrespective, Jobs, Like, Love, People

Each of my book arrives at a form and a style that is appropriate to the subject.

Appropriate, Book, Form, Style, Subject

Have more than one idea on the go at any one time. If it's a choice between writing a book and doing nothing I will always choose the latter. It's only if I have an idea for two books that I choose one rather than the other. I always have to feel that I'm bunking off from something.

Book, Ideas, Nothing, Writing

I always hope to come up with a style of writing that's appropriate to the material and I felt like this was. And then there's plenty of - I don't know if it's the right word but - lampooning, but it's always at my expense.

Plenty, Right, Style, Word, Writing

Life is bearable even when it's unbearable: that is what's so terrible, that is the unbearable thing about it.

Life, Life Is, Terrible, Thing, Unbearable

The only distinction I'd make is between film and telly, I guess. "Film," "movies," and "cinema" are all synonyms as far as I'm concerned; but telly is different. It's just a plodding we've-done-this-scene, we've-done-that-scene and it never becomes this new other thing.

Becomes, Concerned, Different, Film, Synonym, Telly

I would agree on the aging thing. Because, at a certain point, once you start noticing it, it is your subject. And I know young that people, when they get to 30, say, "Oh, I'm so old. " But actually, around 50, you do become conscious of it.

Aging, Become, Conscious, Old, People, Point

I really like the George Clooney of Solaris also filmed by Andrei Tarkovsky, before Steven Soderbergh: that's very obviously sci-fi, and it seems to me a great film. But whatever pigeon-hole you put Stalker into you would both be increasing the risk of disappointing people and diminishing the film.

Clooney, Diminishing, Film, People, Risk, Steven

The process of book writing for me is entirely one of trial and error.

Book, Errors, Trial, Writing

If you help them (the crew) create good memories, they'll forget all the bad stuff

Create, Help, Helping, Memories, Stuff

I don't like my books being defined by their "about"-ness. So now the subtitle has just become a kind of strap-line on the cover.

Book, Books, Defined, Kind, Like

I've never really liked L. A. , because of its sprawl.

Sprawl, Liked

The thing that strikes me, from looking at the names so far in the Donald Trump's Cabinet on the foreign policy side, is the one thing that unites them - and that's General James Mattis at the Pentagon, Mike Pompeo at the CIA, even Mitt Romney to become secretary of state - they're all very, very hawkish on Iran.

Cia, Donald, Foreign Policy, Iran, Policy, Secretary

Nicholson Baker talks about the way in which the most successful nonfiction books are those that can be boiled down into an argument so that everybody can wade in with an opinion without having to undergo the inconvenience of having to read the book itself. The more you can condense it, the better.

Book, Down, Opinion, Read, Successful, Way

There's something about New York. You can get a nice feeling of belonging as a writer here. It's probably the best city on Earth like that. I miss the wisecracking of New York.

City, Earth, Feelings, Missing, Nice, Wisecracking

I want to stress, this is the experience-growing up in a working-class family-that defined me and continues to define me. It's the core of my being. And it explains, incidentally, a good deal about my love of America.

America, Class, Deal, Explains, Growing Up, Stress

He [Thelonious Monk] played each note as though astonished by the previous one, as though every touch of his fingers on the keyboard was correcting an error and this touch in turn became an error to be corrected and so the tune never quite ended up the way it was meant to.

Became, Errors, Never Quit, Thelonious, Tunes, Way

1